


Every Door Opens

by notoska



Series: We Made Ourselves [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: CHAPTERS 18 AND 19 HAVE EXPLICIT CONTENT, Cap's thoughts on suicide/sacrifice are briefly explored in ch 15, It's a slow slow burn my friends, M/M, Mature rating for descriptions of violence, but the rest of the fic is Mature, post Cap 2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-06
Updated: 2014-07-30
Packaged: 2018-01-23 20:06:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 73,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1577855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notoska/pseuds/notoska
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Then Bucky licks his lips, tip of his tongue just grazing the sensitive skin of Steve’s ear and Steve moans. Nothing close to the surge of lust behind his ribs, but a tiny, breathy sound all the same. Bucky doesn’t react—he must not have heard. Though a minute later he curls his fingers and extends them again, moving just slow enough for it to be a caress.</p><p>Just tip your head into his touch. He’ll take the lead and trace the folds of your ear with his tongue until you can’t keep quiet any more. Then he’ll smother your desperate little noises with his mouth, fingers twisting in your hair. Kissing deeply, tongues reaching to declare your filthy intentions. Find his knee with your hand and slide wolfishly up his thigh until you reach the bulge behind his fly. Palm him through his trousers until he’s panting in your mouth, until he’s pressing his forehead to yours, hips bucking, and you can see his dark eyes, glinting in the screen’s flickering light, pleading—</p><p>Steve jolts back to the present. The credits are rolling and Bucky is reading them as well. The screen blacks and two fluorescent lights buzz to life. Bucky loosens his hand from Steve’s head, welcoming the world back in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Just a Matter of Time

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [心有千扉](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4951390) by [cindyfxx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cindyfxx/pseuds/cindyfxx)
  * Translation into Русский available: [Открывается каждая дверь](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6881344) by [wllzft](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wllzft/pseuds/wllzft)



Captain America is slumped in the breakfast aisle. Crouching, with one hand braced against the dated tile floor. His chin rests on his other fist, brows drawn together with thought. Eyes drifting over the boxes that sit, forgotten, at the bottom of the shelf.

He is alone, save for the unfamiliar music drifting through the ceiling speakers.

 

* * *

 

_“Oatmeal?” Steve’s voice sounded too hopeful in his own ears._

_“Yeah!” Bucky sounded happier than he’d been in months. Giddy with a smile that lit up his eyes. “Cheap too,” a little quieter that time._

_“What’d you do, trade him for a pile of soggy newspapers?” Steve tried to keep the dark tension of never enough money, never enough food out of his voice._

_Bucky laughed, “Nah, nothing like that,” he clanged their only pot onto the stove top, “Just a favor for a favor.”_

_Bucky was always pulling strings behind the scenes. Coming home with some surprise every couple of weeks. It wasn’t much but it felt like luxury to Steve. They hadn’t had oatmeal in years._

_Steve had no idea how he made it happen and he suspected that Bucky didn’t want him to. The paper delivery job certainly didn’t pay enough._

_They cooked it carefully, watching the pot boil. Trading an easy back-and-forth about how long to keep it over the flame. Bucky swore he knew what he was doing but Steve guessed he’d never cooked it on his own before. They’d only moved into a place with a real gas stove last winter._

_It tasted wonderful. The gentle sweetness of grain, the soft-scratchy-wet texture on the roof of his mouth. The heat settling in his stomach. The peaceful fullness._

_Warm and content, wrapped in Bucky’s arms, buried under all the blankets, coats, and clothes they owned in their makeshift bed. Three pairs of socks on his feet to stop the chill. Happy and full._

 

* * *

 

Steve lets the grief push deep into his chest. A blunt knife that rips jagged new edges from old scars. He closes his eyes and exhales. He sits with the pain for a moment, waiting for it to retreat.

Then he draws a breath and stands, grabs a box from the shelf with his eyes on the floor.

Sam meets him by the check stands, “Plain?”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t want some sugar or syrup or something?” They unload boxes and cans onto the belt, two or three at a time. Beans. Soup. Noodles. Instant coffee.

“No.”

“Little bits of dried fruit?”

“No,” Steve glances up, “why?”

Sam just shrugs. Steve looks down at the generic oatmeal box in his hand.

“It’s just,” Sam hands two folded bills to the cashier, “it’s not gonna taste like it used to.”

“Yeah,” and the pain in his chest tugs again. Not going to taste like it used to. Not like it was made in beat up pot over a weak flame in Brooklyn. Not like it was something special, something to be shared, “Nothing tastes like it used to.”

 

* * *

 

The corners of their motel room are dim in way that suggests they’ve never seen the sun, or even the feeble light of the lamp on the desk. The only light in the room. Sam flicks through channels with the TV muted. Steve rests his shoulders on a pile of pillows, his head against the wall, his open eyes pointed at the screen, and his mind 337 miles and 78 years away.

He had filed away all his old memories with the file that detailed every Howling Commando’s fate. Too many regrets and nothing he could do but try to forget. And he had forgotten so well, thrown himself so fully into the mission, that seeing Bucky’s face had hit him like bright, close headlights on a dark highway. Something so blinding and urgent that he couldn’t react.

He was alive. He was alive and it changed everything. Upended Steve’s fragile new life in the blink of an eye. He was alive and he needed help. He needed Steve.

In some ways, it felt like a new mission. And one that he’d chosen instead of waiting for it to choose him. But it clawed at him desperately in a way he hadn’t felt since he jumped out of plane, sailing past enemy fire, marching alone toward death with a stage prop strapped to his back. It was more than a mission.

Steve stares at the TV for hours after it goes dark, until an uneasy sleep claims him.

 

* * *

 

_He’s running. Stiff, thick-soled, too-big shoes striking the pavement. His chest is heaving, never could get enough air. He combs the crowd with frantic eyes. He was here a minute ago._

_“Bucky!” Steve’s voice is already hoarse and he realizes he’s been doing this for hours. The fair is closing and the crowd is streaming toward the exit. Steve’s running against the flow, bumping shoulders and bags and tripping over shoes._

_Bucky’s always been fine without him but he’s panicking now. He’s got to find him. The agonizing burn in his lungs tells him it’s critically important. So he pushes forward, zig-zagging through the chaos, circling around each building. Running until he’s gasping. Until he can’t feel his feet. Until his hair clings to his forehead, soaked with sweat. Until he trips and can’t get up again._

 

* * *

 

They’re on the road early, before the sun rises. Following shaky leads. Tracking down men that will never want to talk; that probably know nothing anyway. Steeling themselves against the incredulous laughter that comes. Every time they say they’re looking for a ghost. Clenched fists and simmering frustration between bland roadside meals and TV-lit motel nights.

There’s a quiet resignation that only soldiers know, that comes from doing the same thing over and over until you just do and don’t feel. In the silence of the car, with its constant white-noise highway hum, Steve wishes he could reach that point. That every dead end didn’t feel like a new weight in his stomach. That he didn’t dream of Bucky every night, big memories and small, stitched together into new nightmares or joyous, easy, heartbreaking moments that had never happened.

He wishes the pain wasn’t so fresh but he doesn’t run from it. Soaks in every regret, waits for the tightness in his chest.

Of all the loose ends he left behind in 1945, he never expected the chance to fix this one. When he crashed that ship into the ice, he thought of all the people he left behind and Bucky wasn’t on that list. Just two Brooklyn boys that gave their lives for their country. It was an honorable way to die.

But Steve woke up and he was less of a man and more of a soldier. More alone than he’d ever been. What could he do but return to the fight? 

And then Bucky was there. Leaving him crushed and hopeful and speechless again. Just like in the war. Standing in the rain in Italy and saying his name out loud for the first time in months. Suddenly so close and so far. Across enemy lines, too late, too dangerous, and no one believed him but Steve _knew_ Bucky was there. He was right then and he was right now.

And all the guilt and anger and determination that he’d bottled away came tumbling back. You can’t change the past. But sometimes the past follows you, shoots at you, stabs you, bloodies your face with a metal fist, and gives you a second chance.

Steve rests his head against the car window and breathes. It’s just a matter of time. The guilt doesn’t help, he knows. But when he sits up at night, sleepless and still, he hopes Bucky does the same. He hopes he takes the time to remember. So he’ll know Steve is coming for him.

Steve watches the road with clear blue, open, empty eyes. Just a matter of time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The lovely yvieinsane is working on bringing Every Door Opens to life in a podfic!! Listen to her stunning work over here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/1857414


	2. The World Waits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Winter Soldier follows procedure. He walks west, away from the city, through soybean fields, cutting around small towns. The tracker in his arm broadcasts his location over an encrypted signal. They will come for him.

The body wants to be whole. Even when the body has been at war for over 70 years. 

The Winter Soldier knows he can walk for another two days without resting. He has already reset his shoulder. It has been bound to his side for three days and will be fully healed by sunset.

The Winter Soldier follows procedure. He walks west, away from the city, through soybean fields, cutting around small towns. The tracker in his arm broadcasts his location over an encrypted signal. They will come for him.

But James Buchanan Barnes knows something is wrong. He is tired and his mind demands sleep. So in the evening of the third day, when he can’t hear the sounds of cars or farms, he stops walking.

He sits in the shadow of three trees that have grown too close, roots overlapping and rising from the ground. A creek cuts through the rich farmland. He rests his boots on the marshy grasses growing thick and tall on the narrow banks.

 

* * *

 

_Georgi Ivanov Markov_

_Bulgarian Dissident_

_Living in London_

_September 7th, 1978_

 

_The sky was clouded over and it was 15°C. The Winter Soldier found the target in his sights long before the agent on the ground arrived. He was barely 30 meters back, on the roof of a building that rose two stories above the bridge. It was unusually short range for the unusually small projectile. No bullets this time. He fired the ricin pellet, easily hitting the back of the target’s thigh. The man started and looked behind him. Just as planned, the agent picked up his umbrella and crossed the street. Like clockwork._

_The Winter Soldier stepped back on the roof and disassembled his gun. Sliding the pieces into pockets, storing the stock by his side. He scanned the area for complications and turned away. Extracted before the target boarded his bus._

 

* * *

 

The Winter Soldier remembers every target. He remembers every kill. The memories are all clear and sharp. He knows how to assemble, sight, clean, and disassemble thousands of weapons. He knows how to plant bombs, disable cars at speed, and slit a sleeping man’s throat without waking the other person in the bed.

But it’s all shifting now. He sits under the trees. Burbling creek, soft breeze, warm sun. And then he blinks and it all feels different. More, closer, brighter. Another blink and it’s different again.

Disorienting in a way he hasn’t felt in years. Mechanical precision gives way to tumultuous waves. Detailed reports give way to sensation, thought, emotion. It had been a lovely day in London. Bright despite the clouds. He could hear laughter on the bridge when he took the shot. Things he hadn’t remembered, hadn’t noticed before, now swelled up, coloring and changing the scene. A new well of memories, more vibrant and vulnerable than anything he’d felt before.

James Buchanan Barnes raises his metal arm, glinting in the sunlight. He knows how to clean ash from its creases. Knows its weaknesses, which joints to protect from bullets. Which spots are sharpest against human skin.

In this new clarity he sees it as more than a weapon. It’s a part of him. He flexes the sculpted fingers and vaguely remembers a time when he had two arms of flesh and blood. He reaches down to the creek bank and presses the pad of his metal index finger against his thumb, closing around a slender blade of grass.

He separates his fingers and the tip of the blade falls without a sound. James Buchanan Barnes tries again. Closing metal finger tips slowly around another leaf, concentrating with steady eyes. Again, his fingers pinch a clean cut in the plant. He tries again. And again. Until the blades are only badly bruised, tip hanging on by wilted, dark green threads. The sun has set. He tries again and again until he barely leaves a mark, vision still clear in the moonlight. Until he can touch without breaking.

Then James Buchanan Barnes lays down in the grass. Because he feels he should. Because his mind wants it even if his body doesn’t need it. Because he doesn’t question himself.

 

* * *

 

_James Buchanan Barnes stands at the edge of a tall building. He’s so high up that the wind drowns out the city sounds. He finds his target through the scope of his rifle, 13 floors down in the building across the street. He has thirty seconds to make the kill. There is a helicopter two blocks away, ready for extraction._

_He rests the gun on the guardrail and pushes it against his shoulder. Cheek pressed to cold metal. His long hair whips around his face. They said it would be a difficult shot, but the Winter Soldier doesn’t think in probabilities. There is only the mission. You have only one shot._

_Suddenly, the wind picks up, swirling abruptly, pushing cold at his back. He is completely still, breathing steady, adjusting his aim for the current._

_A cold finger winds up his spine. He blinks. His stomach drops. James Buchanan Barnes lifts his head from the rifle and looks up. He is afraid. He hasn’t felt fear—ever? Has he ever felt this way before? If not, then why does he know it like an old friend. Like blood over red, white, and blue._

_James Buchanan Barnes looks down. The rifle sags on his shoulder. He has twenty-two seconds to make the kill. His hair whips into his eyes and he breathes in. The air is cold in his nose, his throat, his lungs. His leather jacket protects him from the chill, his thick-soled boots on the never-washed steel and concrete of that roof. Closer to heaven than earth._

_He has thirteen seconds to make the kill. James Buchanan Barnes can see the street below. He can see the ships in the harbor beyond the city’s banks. He can see the sun cresting over the afternoon clouds._

_He has nine seconds to make the kill. James Buchanan Barnes can hear the helicopter’s blades chopping the air. The wind intensifies as it slows to hover behind him._

_He has four seconds to make the kill. James Buchanan Barnes breathes out. His breath is hot over his lips._

_He has two seconds to make the kill._

 

* * *

 

He wakes up vomiting. His eyes open to nothing but shadows. His mind reels and he retches again. The sound of his body revolting is foreign in his ears. His hand is braced against the creek bank, fingers muddy and cold. The midnight moonlight reflects off the bile-slicked grass.

Nausea washes over him, through him, carrying him back through memory after memory. All crisp and clear, like they’ve always been. But now, replayed in this unstable mind, they feel so violent, so barbaric. Blood sprayed against the car window, driver dead. Blood on the pillow, gushing sickly from a clean slice. Blood seeping into fine cotton from a knife through the lungs, a slow bleed. Blood on his hands. There was so much blood on his hands.

He’d killed dozens of men within minutes of seeing them. One shot, no return fire. He’d closed a steel fist around screaming throats. He’d eliminated complications without hesitation. One bullet, right between the eyes. Security guards, wives, neighbors, children.

James Buchanan Barnes can’t breathe. Grief rips through him, devastating and final. _What have I done._ Horror consumes him because the memories aren’t new. The same memory two days ago and he felt nothing, now he can’t breathe. _What’s changed?_ He’s known what he’s done all along.

James presses his head into his hands. His body shakes with sobs too deep to make a sound. His fingers don’t recognize the face contorted against them. What was tightly knit is now unwound. What was calm is now chaos. _And what has changed?_ James cries out with the pain and knows he is losing his mind.

 

* * *

 

The sound of the birds singing before dawn is unlike anything he’s ever heard. When the sun finally rises, the world bursts into unbelievable color. He watches the sky, each incredible hue glowing bright before melting into soft blue.

His body is weak in a strange way. The Winter Soldier gauged his strength by time. The Winter Soldier’s clock tells him he has 36 hours to find food. But his body feels heavy, his mind in a haze. Distantly, he knows this is hunger.

James leans over the creek. Hands braced on either bank. A cold shock to his lips. The water _tastes_ —has water always had a taste? He drinks and the world waits.

James stands and heads back toward the city. He’s been out of cryo for a week. The longest time in years. Decades even.

 

* * *

 

He approaches a farmer’s shed without slowing. He knows there is no one nearby but could not tell you how he knows. Smash the padlock from the door. Something long and thin and sharp. Force back the third panel up from the wrist. Pry out the tracker. Crush it to dust and soldering with two metal fingers.

Open two more sheds and James finds corn in cold storage. He can carry twelve ears. He eats as he walks, letting the husks and bitten cobs drop in a curious trail behind him.

By dusk he is weaving back through suburbs. They were a monotonous blur a day ago, now brilliant with detail. James notices each new kind of plastic, the way every lawn is lush with no brown spots, the styling on each make of car. He will walk through the night.

He passes through a plot of undeveloped land, tall grass brushing his knees. Two glowing eyes glint from the shadows; a male deer stands frozen. James notices the graceful curve of his antlers. The woody texture where they join the fuzz between his ears. 

As he walks, he notices things inside himself as well. Certain feelings, ways of thinking, certain movements, preferences, opinions. He tries them on like clothes brought down from the attic. Familiar but dated, not quite how he remembered them. 

He brushes his hair from his eyes, fingers combing back across his head. He tries the same movement with his left hand but it feels wrong. Foreign to both his skin and the synapses in his mind that call for his arm but trigger a machine instead. He tries again, gentler, but it feels too careful. He tries again.

Nothing but blood when he closes his eyes and nothing but beauty when he opens them.

 

* * *

 

He returns to the same bank. Grass still matted, now wilting to brown, where bodies and boots pressed heavy. He sits where he once stood.

 _I was here._ James tries his new way of thinking, weaving facts with feelings. _Did I complete the mission?_ He remembers pulling the target to the bank. He remembers how it felt to swim, pulling that man with a steel grip, tucking his injured arm into the strap across his chest to stop the spasming pain, kicking through the murky green and brown. The Winter Soldier knew he could swim for another 10 minutes and 24 seconds without coming up for air. _We fell into the water. Or he fell. I… jumped?_

James furrows his brow. It’s surprisingly difficult to pull this memory into frame. It swims and slips away, fuzzy and dim. Before it comes back, it burns in his stomach, like a gentle warning.  _We were in the helicarrier. The shield was gone. I had him pinned_. And it all bubbles up, sick and rushing, a wound deep enough to break him. _Steven Rogers_. Nausea floods in again, bile sour at the back of his throat, and he vomits before he can stand. _Did I kill him?_

James’ arms shake and he looks up with unseeing eyes. A new, deeper horror crushes his chest. Worse than every blood stained memory. Worse than every death around his neck. There are no words but his body knows. Desperation closes his throat. _Did I kill him?_ He remembers every shot, none quite finding their mark. Stabbing those holes through canvas and precious flesh. His stomach heaves again. _He can’t be dead._ The scene replays, every detail blinding in this new mind.

 

_What have I done._


	3. Acid in your Lungs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They move through the morning in slow motion because they have nowhere to go. They have no leads and haven’t for days. It’s been over three weeks since Steve woke up on that river bank and he’s never spent so much time spinning his wheels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A soundtrack suggestion for this chapter! 
> 
> Turning Into Stone by Phantogram  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQO-k8wHrHg

“Nothing, Cap.”

“What about the tracker?”

“No leads."

“Old files? Mission reports? Where are the handlers?”

“Long gone. Look, we’re picking through the pieces. I will let you know if we find _anything._ ” Fury sounded tired.

“I know.” Steve watches the road, “I just can’t let them find him first.”

“Ain’t nobody left to look.”

“I’ve heard that before.” A staticky pause and there’s nothing left to say, “You take care of yourself, Nick.”

“You too Cap.” The line goes dead.

Steve drops the phone in his lap, eyes on the green blur of fields and farms that stretches for days and days.

Sam won’t say anything so Steve breaks the silence instead. 

“Nothing,” he fights down the strain in his voice, “Nothing from the clean-up either.” He’s still got a couple of friends on the ground in D.C., picking through SHIELD’s rubble, who he trusts enough to ask for a favor. Trusts to look for a ghost.

“Well that’s good news,” Sam keeps his eyes straight ahead, one hand on the wheel, “He’s running.”

 

* * *

 

_The asset demonstrates remarkable resiliency._

Steve sets down the file and stands. He walks as far as he can in their room, to the bathroom mirror, hands on the sink. He’s read the rest of the file countless times. But this letter, creased, with that familiar typewriter texture—each letter pressed into the page. He hadn’t ever made it past the first sentence. From Zola to some Hydra politician, about their _asset_.

The asset? The Winter Soldier? Bucky? Steve swallows thickly. He still can’t commit to a name. Just a clear-eyed, too-close _him_ always in his thoughts. Too horrible to think of him as anything but Bucky, too heartbreaking to think of him as someone he might not be anymore.

 _Get it together, Rogers._ He raises his head, meets his reflection’s gaze. His eyes are tired, lines creasing his forehead. _Since when do you give up so easy? It’s Bucky._

Steve strides back to the desk. Dim lamp light illuminating old paper. He jerks open the black-out curtains. Sunlight spills in. _It’s Bucky._

He sits down, one hand braced against the chair back.

_There are qualities beyond the physical that determine a soldier’s worth. Too often, these noble qualities are compromised by human fragility, by fear, by loyalty, or any number of misguided emotions. That is why great armies fall, because they are merely men underneath their uniforms. The greatest asset, the one that humanity deserves, is not a man at all._

Steve’s chest is tight. _Not a man at all._ He tastes the same bitterness he drank away in that bombed out bar, burning at the back of his throat.

_The greatest asset can think, act, and—critically—kill with no motive but the completion of his mission. He has man’s strength of purpose with none of his emotional needs. He needs no dogma, no leader. He does not need to believe. Even a mercenary demands his pay, and thus, can be corrupted. The asset demands nothing._

_Only a man who is already willing to sacrifice his life can achieve that purity of purpose; a man who fights not to survive, but to protect._

Steve bites down, jaw flexing, and his eyes are rimmed with red. _A man who fights not to survive_. A thousand back alley fights. Fists to teeth. Boots to bones. _Not to survive_. Guilt forces the air from his lungs.

_A readiness to kill cannot be taught, only the relative power of that instinct can be manipulated. That was the original purpose of our research and its success is undeniable. The greatest asset has avenged, with a single bullet, wrongs that entire armies had failed to right. A more poetic man might say: he is the essence of man’s will to fight for something more than himself._

The words burn fresh in the stark summer sun. Too bright on the white page. It is worse than the  mission reports, than the cryo logs, than the kill lists. Seeing it for what it really was, laid out in Zola’s proud words. Their raw intentions. Find a man too strong for his own good and strip him of his humanity. Take Bucky’s best parts and twist them around. Every defense a new wound.

_Unfortunately, it is not easy to parse the human psyche. The asset is unflinching in battle but becomes volatile over time. For this reason he is kept suspended until his expertise is needed, and is animated for no longer than 5 days at a time. His mind may be electrically reset to delay the onset of instability by 48 to 72 hours._

Steve’s eyes squeeze shut, block out the light. A broken sob. It is worse than losing him. New grief for old wounds. _Hadn’t he given enough._ His mouth twists and he blinks away his tears, wet and warm and 50 years too late.

_Though we have made great strides, the human mind is still marginally stronger than our science. It seeks out its missing pieces, as if weakness makes strength possible. Perhaps his inconstancy enables his unwavering fist. We leave these questions for men to contemplate in more peaceful times._

Drop the page. Shut the file. Out the door. Gasp in the summer heat. Walk so you feel like you’re going somewhere. Run till you think you’re closer now. Don’t cry. Don’t _fucking_ cry like that means something. Every sunset is another day wasted. Another day you didn’t come back for him.

 

* * *

 

Bitter coffee in a stained cup. Steve drinks it for the taste, almost like it used to. Burned over an army fire. Miles from Brooklyn but it had felt like home. That heat by his side, smirking smile, voice so familiar it still echoes in his head.

Sam chews his toast, forearms rest heavy on the table edge.

They move through the morning in slow motion because they have nowhere to go. They have no leads and haven’t for days. It’s been over three weeks since Steve woke up on that river bank and he’s never spent so much time spinning his wheels.

Sam cocks his head the way he does when he’s about to speak. Steve looks away. Doesn’t want to hear it. The search is all he has.

They get in the car, breathing in the stale, suffocating heat while Sam starts the engine. He heads back toward D.C. and Steve watches the scenery. Never felt so helpless.

 

* * *

 

_Bucky’s hand grips his coat. His eyes are wide and terrified. “Don’t let them—,” he chokes, “Don’t let them take you, too.”_

_Steve’s heart jumps and his pulse is flying. Adrenaline takes over and he’s going to get them_ the hell out of there. 

_But he can’t move. Can’t even close his hand around Bucky’s. Can’t speak. Just sickening stillness while his body screams at itself._

_Bucky’s face is thin, the way it was during the march back to camp. Tired and bruised, but side-by-side, like they were supposed to be._

_It’s freezing cold and Bucky is shaking. His mouth is set in a brave line but his eyes rip right through Steve’s frozen chest. Betrayed._

_Two more horrible shaky breaths, the way men breathe before death, and it’s all still. So cold he can’t think. Bucky’s face just an ice crystal mask. Frozen side-by-side, like they were supposed to be._

 

* * *

 

Steve starts, head hits the car ceiling. He gasps for air, reveals too much.

“Hey, you’re okay,” Sam’s voice is steady but his concern is obvious, “Bad dream.” An explanation for both of them.

Breathe in, wait for the shaking to stop, breathe out. The car sits crooked on the highway shoulder. Sways slightly in the wake of passing cars.

“Yeah.”

“Listen. You gotta make your peace with the past.” Sam grips his shoulder warmly, “We’re gonna keep looking. Not gonna stop till you find him. But—” Sam swallows, “Your pain is gonna tear you apart before we get there.”

He sits back, lifts his hand from Steve’s shoulder. 

“You keep reliving it. It’s all over your face.”

Steve looks at his hands.

“Regret doesn’t bring him back.”

 

* * *

 

Steve passes the time with his sketchbook. He draws what’s right in front of him. His shoes. The dashboard. The apple core at his feet. The empty coffee cups between the seats. His lines are shaky from the car’s gentle bounce.

 

* * *

 

_“Wow, Buck!” Surprise and worry and gratitude competing behind his eyes, “This is brand new!”_

_“You bet it is.” Nothing but pride beaming back._

_“How—” Steve couldn’t find the words, thick in his throat at the sight of his smile._

_“Doesn’t matter,” he shrugged. Hair tipped forward onto his forehead. His skin was grey with a thin coat of grime. New job at the docks. Hands black with soot but the sketchbook was spotless._

_Steve flipped through the off-white pages and looked up, “Thank you.” All he can say, too many debts to ever repay him._

_Bucky’s eyes flickered warm, dark, worried, “Anything for you, punk.”_

 

* * *

 

They’re pulling back into Sam’s neighborhood. Steve sits up to a pang of guilt in his gut. He didn’t realize they were so close.

Sam pulls into his driveway, parks, and opens the car door. One fluid movement, so there’s no space for questions.

Steve opens his door and stands in the crook of its hinge, arms on the roof, “Sam.” Sam pauses but doesn’t meet his eyes. Too many debts again, “Thank you.”

“Thank me when it’s over.”

Steve draws a breath, “I know. I just—“ Skin scorched on the car’s metal roof, “What if—” easier thought than spoken, “What if he’s really gone.” A question so vulnerable it becomes a statement.

“Then we would’ve found a body.” Sam’s voice is flat, “He’ll want to come home eventually.”

Steve watches his back disappear into the house. Palm of his hand against the crease between his eyes. He remembers waking up on that bank. Choking on river water, paralyzed with pain. He’d seen the tracks. He knew he was dragged onto that bank, heavy, sure boot prints at his side. _I have to follow him._ Then he woke up in a hospital bed.

“Hey,” Sam’s voice makes him jump. He’s leaning out the front door, yelling like no one’s listening, “Maybe he’s looking for you.  Maybe all you gotta do is sit still long enough for him to find you.”

Steve is silent. _It’s been too long already._ Bucky could’ve found him on the road if he wanted to. _No, he’s not looking._ Steve’s chest is so tired of the grief that it offers no resistance. It hits heavy and deep. _He’s not coming home._

Steve rests his head against the car. _A man who fights not to survive, but to protect._ He punches the door.

“I don’t know what to do, Buck.” Quiet and weary. Anger and grief and fear just stews if you don’t let it out. It can drive you, but not for long, because it eats you from the inside. Acid in your lungs.

Steve will walk into the city tomorrow. Back to the wreck and the chaos. Back to the blood and shattered glass. And he will walk until he finds him. Or is found. He will wait in the open, search with the reporters in his face and his face on the news. Because he can’t just hope Bucky comes home.

 


	4. Heals Better Than it Should

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s 100 yards away, blurred by the heat waves, but it’s him. The only man in the whole world that knows his face. James lets go of the wrought iron and drops three stories. He hits the asphalt with a deep thud and strides to the end of the alley.

You wake up afraid until you just wake up. And wake up. And wake up. Days pass and the sun keeps rising.

 

* * *

 

Naked in front of the scratched glass. Hazy reflection of a sharp frame. Skin all over, fragile shield.

James steps closer, inches from the mirror. He touches his face. It feels young, younger than it feels from the inside. A touch of red around his eyes. A scruff of hair on his face, down his neck. 

His hair hangs loose, wisps in front of his eyes, falls over his ears, settles soft on his shoulders.

He touches the curve of his lips, sensitive where they meet, where soft and dry becomes soft and wet.

 

* * *

 

James just lived. Breathed, ate, slept, sat. He stayed near the bank, tucked into the reeds. Sometimes he walked into the river, water up to his neck, to feel the icy current through his clothes. Then laid on the bank, face toward the sun, cooking in the first heat wave of summer, until he was dry again.

He floated through old memories and new thoughts. The drive that once pushed him past exhaustion was now gone. His mind unwound into the space, resisting any urge to do.

Over a week had passed. The Winter Soldier could tell you exactly how many hours had passed but James didn’t care to know, so he didn’t ask.

In the evenings, the moon was barely brighter than the distant city lights and the crickets sang out in the muggy air. And he was lonely. He soaked it in, turned over his tired heart and inspected its bruises, just to feel.

 

* * *

 

His neck looks familiar. Exposed like this. Vulnerable without a jacket pulled up at the collar. He traces the veins he can see. Irregular patterns, very human.

His hand comes to rest on his collarbone. Feels thicker somehow. _Thicker than?_ The muscles of his chest are firm. There’s a thin line across his ribs. He can see the lighter color, subtle texture, but there’s no tell-tale scar tissue ridge. This body heals better than it should.

He presses his palm flat against his skin and holds his breath. He can feel his heart beat.

 

* * *

 

James ate late-spring berries and foraged food. He’d lived in the wilderness before, with men that counted him as one of their own. There was a war before all this. He lived before he killed. He was young once. James traced the holes in his memory.

_Just run._ What does it matter now. Leave this place and start over. There’s nothing behind you but death, nothing to stay for.

Except the hurt in that man’s eyes. He knew me and I knew him. A fragile thread—s _napped in my clumsy hands. I left him barely breathing. I am nothing but violence._

But all the world is beauty. There are so many people—more fragile and gentle than he is—that simply live. _Just start over_.There is no reason to believe that whatever-came-before was any better than the clockwork kills.

_I think I tried to kill the only man I ever knew._ James sharpened a knife with precise, steady strokes. Flat against a carefully chosen stone.

His mind flitted between thought, emotion, resolution, and doubt in a way that was still strange and unsettling. He felt uneasy with his own decisions, not knowing where they came from. But what choice did he have.

And besides, he wakes up. And wakes up.

But it’s hard to run when you don’t know what you’re running from. Why not track down the man with the familiar face and ask— _What have I forgotten?_

James stood. Decision made. He sheathed his knife and walked toward the city.

 

* * *

 

Fingers trace the seam where metal meets skin. Deep, ridged scars bite into his chest. The deepest scars on his body. Hand glides over the interlocking metal plates. Thumb tracing the crevasses. Feels like armor even when it’s naked.

James flexes his arm and the plates ripple. He wonders where it came from, why he used it to kill so many people.

His living hand is steady and skilled. Fingernails trimmed in utilitarian lines. Curiosity comes back to him like second-nature.

 

* * *

 

He remembered the city as black and white map lines, elevations, extraction points. But it was a brilliantly bright, living thing. People everywhere, colors in clothing he’d never seen, trees blooming on well-kept streets.

The sun beats down and he keeps to the rooftops. Familiar crouch and run, pause to watch. Two quick steps. Leap. Roll into the landing. Kneel at the edge. Pause to watch. A trickle of sweat down his back cuts a cool path through the stifling heat.

This jacket wasn’t meant to be lived in. He glances down, leather straps buttoned over his chest. It fits him exactly, bends with his body, snug against the seam of his left arm. Eyes back on the sidewalk. He could have less.

The buildings grow taller and older and denser as he slips between them, closer and closer to the city. He’s climbing a fire escape, passing old brick and lead-lined window frames, when he sees him. A quick glance to check the end of the alley and there he is. James freezes.

He’s 100 yards away, blurred by the heat waves, but it’s him. The only man in the whole world that knows his face. James lets go of the wrought iron and drops three stories. He hits the asphalt with a deep thud and strides to the end of the alley.

_Celebrating Captain America: The Man. The Legend. The Symbol._

His face framed in blue. Posed and smiling under a wave of blond hair.

James blinks. At the bottom of the poster: 1000 Jefferson Dr SW. 

42 minutes away. Mission mind. His feet turn and he’s moving. Already on course; clock is ticking. He looks down as he walks back to the fire escape. _I can’t walk in like this._

 

* * *

 

His hips are built, graceful lines cut down through long legs. Soft patterns of hair. He bends his knees and muscles ripple. Stronger than they once were, but still lean. His ankles look the same, though. He lifts the left one, foot perched on the well-worn bench, to see it in the light.

There’s puckering there. An old burn. Skin that pocked and stretched as it tried to heal. James realizes that his body has been many places he can’t remember. It knows reflexive postures that he doesn’t understand. Sit back, arms in restraints, open your mouth. Bite down. Freezing cold and searing pain. Hoarse voice screaming in his ears.

 

* * *

 

James leaps the gaps between instincts and training. Lands on a tar roof, tacky texture under his boots. He finds a thrift store with an alley exit. Couldn’t tell you how he knows what to look for. He crouches against the ventilation system on a neighboring roof so he can watch people come and go. Mission mind but his heart knocks against his ribs. _What are you?_

It’s one thing to feel human—Breathe, eat, sleep, sit—and another to appear that way to others. The voice in his memories only gives commands; he’s not sure how questions will sound on his tongue. He hasn’t spoken to anyone since Steven Rogers. And what does his face look like now?

He feels out this vise around his lungs. _Are you afraid?_

James sits back on his feet, hot leather against thick metal. Industrial hum from the vents.

He stands and shakes his body into a casual posture, square shoulders, eyes up. He paces on the roof, trying out the idea of being without watching. _If you want to be a person you’ve got to start at some point._ James can imitate brilliantly. There was one daylight mission where he had to walk in the front door. Long sleeves and tight gloves. No muzzle. But he wants more than a well-practiced act. 

He wants to be. To find himself in this frame. To be a person instead of a body with nightmares for memories. So maybe he can actually belong—not blend in. So he can show Steven Rogers things are different now.

Because he needs Steven Rogers. When you reach the point where you can’t just take, you have to start asking for favors. When your mind spins empty on its axis and you stare at the world like you’ve been blind, breathe like you’ve never inhaled. You have to ask for help. Nothing more human than that.

He falls to the street, graceful figure in the air, boots connect with the pavement. James emerges from the alley shadow with his head up. He keeps his eyes straight ahead and feels strangers staring.

Push open the door, walk in without hesitation. That part’s easy. Pants. He scans the aisle, heads toward the dark canvas at the end. Any of these will work. They’re arranged by size. He looks down, unfamiliar with his own proportions. Never needed to consider his body’s shape.

 

* * *

 

Eyes return to his face. _You haven’t aged._ 34 missions. 136 days of memory. Just over four months. What about the rest of it.

Years passed between the dates in his mind, and there’s nothing in those gaps. Just missing numbers, not even a sense of passing time. Close your eyes, open them, 3 years in the fleeting void.

He’s been awake for 22 days now and it’s incredible how many hours there are. Being alive all the time.

 

* * *

 

Pants, shirt, jacket, duffel. Under his arm and into the dim changing room. He strips quietly. Folding his one-armed jacket. Kicking off his boots.

Then he catches sight of himself in the mirror. Half-second hesitation but he’s too proud. _What are you afraid of?_ Turn to the reflection and stare.

 

* * *

 

Breathing soft in the stillness. Enough questions.

James tugs on the pants, shirt over his head. Canvas jacket fits well, flip up the collar.

He stuffs everything else into the bag. Grabs the handles and turns. But he still feels naked. Sets down the duffel, rummages through the dark fabric. He has three grenades, five knives, two guns, a spare clip, and four cyanide pellets. For the first time, it feels strange to carry these things. He digs out two knives, one tucks into his boot, the other into his waistband. 

There is a worn cap hanging from a hook on the wall. He has seen hats like this but never worn one. He slides it over his hair, pulls it low over his eyes.

Open the curtain, a little too quickly. Head down. Eleven steps to the door. Push into the mid-day heat. He stays on the sidewalk, walking in long, unhurried block-length lines. A little more at ease now, though he’s the only one for miles wearing a jacket.

His giant face rises like a beacon from four blocks away. A banner across the museum entrance. James cuts through the park—grass makes a soft swishing sound when you walk on it—up the steps and under the Gothic arch.

The moment he’s inside, air conditioning cooling his skin, the floor drops out from under him.

_That’s me._ His own face. Young and brave and determined. He came looking for Steven’s story and found his own. Wool straps across his chest, collar pulled up, leather belt. Gun in his hands. A sniper.

_Have I always been a soldier?_

But it’s the face next to his that kicks him in the gut. _Steve_. James is reeling. He was looking for clues to whatever-came-before but he didn’t expect this. _I was on his side._ A public life to match the one’s he’s lived in the shadows. _I was someone once._ People pass and stare up at his painted self. He stares with them, heart pounding. 

Emotion spikes in his chest and he’s back on the helicarrier.

So angry. He hadn’t realized that before. He was always so angry, but it tore through him—savage and desperate—on that metal-grate bridge. Deafening in his mind. Ragged hole in his chest. His body screaming at him. He didn’t know what to do but fight. There was only the mission.

But it got worse. Terror swelled until it owned him. Fist frozen in the air, staring down at his face. Bruised and bleeding. Chest heaving. And when he fell, James broke as well. And then there wasn’t just the mission anymore.

The sky dropped and the world fell away and everything that mattered disappeared under the water. There was nothing left to fight. He just let go.

James blinks and takes a step. Been rooted in place, gaping in from the entrance, and people are starting to stare at his flesh and blood face, too. He shuffles forward, head down, hanging onto the back of crowds. 

The memories come rushing by, like they’ve sprung up around him, not unfurled themselves in his own mind. Surprising and fresh and vulnerable and heartbreaking. Memories before death. With smells and sounds and feeling. Swimming in a crowded pool, people all around laughing and shrieking, blissful cool water in the summer heat. Steve’s hair pushed back and dripping. Walking the fairgrounds at night, eyes lit up by flashing lights. Bought Steve some cotton candy, pink tongue, sticky fingers. Bloody knuckles, footsteps fleeing, find something cold for Steve’s new bruise, blooming blue and red.

Darker ones too. He remembers these uniforms. Making their way through the woods. Cold toes, cold fingers. Quiet breaths before the attack. Smiling around a fire. Watching the crinkles around Steve’s eyes when he laughed.

His black and white newsprint likeness snaps him back to the present. His eyes crawl over that face, drink in the text. A floor-to-ceiling map, just for him. _Here’s who you were._ Childhood friend. _We fought side-by-side._ The only Howling Commando to give his life. _Bucky Barnes._

 

_I died in 1945._

 

A life lived. Memories, friends, purpose, death. A complete cycle. A hero. The gaps that had been quiet questions now loomed. Dark clouds, dark secrets.

Anger grows hot and nauseating, under his skin. _Someone brought me back from the dead_. His body tenses and his fingers twitch. _I fought someone else’s war._ All this time. Mission mind. _I’ll find them_. Eyes harden. _At least this body knows how to get revenge._ Violence twists in his bones.

Two breaths and resignation settles in, jaded and quieting. He fights it—frustration and justification—but Bucky is tired. Swallow the bitterness. _Enough death. You’re alive. Just start over._

Bucky makes his way out of the building, across the grass, back to the forgotten city spaces.

 

* * *

 

_Free Showers_

Bucky ducks inside. Mumble something at the front desk. Keep your sleeves down and your left hand in your pocket. Two towels and a key.

Bucky strips again. Clothes, duffel, boots in a pile by the door. He sets one knife on the soap dispenser. Arm’s reach. He turns on the water, lets it hit his chest. It is hot and soft and wonderful. Hand against the tile, melt into the stream. Breathe out. You’re alive.

_Could I be Bucky again?_

What the hell happened between death and life? This body knew a life that his mind did not. Days felt like an eternity but all those years were nothing. No museum display to explain his metal arm. Or the missions. Or the bloody memories.

Breathe in the hot steam and let the water run grey down the drain. He uses too much soap, lather dripping from his hands, sliding down his legs. 

A new birth: new name, clean skin.

_Just get your answers and start over._

Hesitancy crystalizes to certainty. Steve. serum. ice. sleep. _His story feels like mine._ It’s reassuring to have a mission again. But it’s never so simple now; concern tugs. Why is every new memory of Steve? _How deep is this wound?_ It’s one thing to seek meaning—Search, think, remember, regret—and another to realize you may have meant something to someone else.

Bucky runs his fingers through his hair. In this heat he can’t feel the difference between metal and skin. Just ten points of pressure on his scalp, delicious sensation, a shiver up his spine.

Once you decide to look, finding is easy. Bucky knows how to hunt; these skills come to him reflexively. Easier than walking down the sidewalk. Even if Steve is running, Bucky will find him. _But when has Steve ever run?_


	5. I will be your Memory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And the men in uniform bury their faces in familiar shoulders, leave wet tears on their necks, because they have come home. They have come home again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack suggestion! 
> 
> https://play.spotify.com/track/5JycHFzub3tKq2Zm9524u2  
> Destroy my Brain (Ingo Star Cruiser Remix) by The Late Greats (doesn't seem to be on Youtube!)
> 
> Enjoy the chapter!

A breeze whispers at his back, a chill swirl in air still warm from yesterday’s scorching heat. The sun is an hour away from cresting over the horizon, the world washed in blue.

Steve walks without time or place. Just inside the city limits now, his feet carry him through neighborhoods, past old industrial blocks, over parking lots. No destination but the search itself. 

He watches the sidewalk and watches the sky. Can’t look ahead, can’t watch people passing. Can’t let his heart jump every time he sees a man with shaggy dark hair. Every time he hears footsteps rounding the corner. Can’t look down every alley with hope in his eyes, quiet and helpless.

He should have brought a jacket but enjoys the chill. Dew on his skin, but he doesn’t get goosebumps anymore.

 

* * *

 

_“Hey!” A voice behind him, Steve turns._

_“Hey, Steve!” The man jogs up, “I’ve been looking all over for you!” He closes the distance and Steve stares. Can’t breathe with his heart in his throat._

_Bucky slows to a walk, three steps and he’s right in front of him. Real and happy and whole and smiling. “Whereya been?” His softly accented voice, the curl of his lips, the fondness in his eyes._

_Steve opens his mouth but there is nothing he can possibly say. His heart splits open and regret and relief pours out. He falls forward, desperately, and clasps Bucky to his chest. The soft heat and firmness of his body, perfect in his arms. Steve sobs, broken; a man who has felt too much._

_It is a hero’s reception. It is every tearful reunion Steve has ever seen for every returning serviceman at every airport. The urgent embrace of family, clinging and crying because their heart, their entire world, can be held in their arms. Because they are complete now. And the men in uniform bury their faces in familiar shoulders, leave wet tears on their necks, because they have come home. They have come home again._

 

* * *

 

Steve stops mid-stride. He wipes a wet cheek on the shoulder of his shirt. _Your pain is gonna tear you apart before we get there._

Steve walks and his eyes chase the shadows. A boot retreating around a building, a flash of black on a roof, the click of metal on metal.

He’s well into the city now, weaving through row houses and trim parks. The temperature has begun to rise already, the world’s blue hue lightens and lightens, preparing to be bathed in gold. Steve watches his sneakers on the pavement. He turns down another neighborhood street.

Black boots, planted squarely. Stiff, dark canvas falling over the laces. Steve’s eyes snap up. _It’s him._

Adrenaline jumps and floods him. It is impossible. His body flushes, blood fleeing to the surface of his skin.

Bucky watches him. He is still, with his hands in his pockets, cap pulled low over his eyes. His face is carefully blank. His eyes calm. He is impossible to read, and yet, it does not matter.

Steve feels every emotion he’s dreamed and daydreamed. All at once and stronger than he could have imagined.

“Hi Buck,” he croaks. Can’t help himself. He has finally come home again.

“Hi Steve,” Bucky’s voice is hoarse and quiet but so perfect. Exactly as it has always been. 

His chest collapses on itself, just hearing Bucky say his name— _is this real?_ His mind spins.

He opens his mouth to speak but there is nothing he can possibly say. _He knows me._ He wants to fall forward, clasp him close, drown him in his relief. But he is frozen.

Bucky looks worried, a crease deepens between his eyes. Steve stutters, desperate to keep this apparition, “Do you—” his voice betrays him, “Do you want to—go get some coffee?”

Bucky’s face eases, “Yeah.”

They stare at each other a moment longer with unguarded eyes. Steve takes a step back and blinks, the world comes back into focus, “Great, uh—” he looks around, heart still pounding, _this is strange_ , “How about—?” he gestures towards the diner on the corner. Bucky dips his chin in a nod.

They make their way across the street, each too aware of the other. Electric air crackles between their bodies. Steve’s mind stitches questions together and his heart rips them up. _One step at a time._ Bucky keeps his hands in his pockets.

Steve pulls open the door and steps aside. Fleeting eye contact as Bucky steps past him into the air conditioned space. A woman calls out from three tables away and Steve responds. He watches Bucky scan the room.

Steve leads them to a booth at the far end of the row. Bucky sits against the wall, so there is nothing behind him but brick and chipping paint. And maybe it’s not so surprising. That he would simply re-appear. That they’d get coffee at a diner before dawn. How else do you welcome a friend back from the dead?

The woman places menus and coffee mugs, practiced words spill from her mouth that neither man hears. Bucky stares at him and Steve stares back.

When she retreats, an awkward silence settles. A man across the room sips his coffee and breathes in the steam. Steve glances at his hands, not sure what to say now. A careful thought meekly speaks from under the torrent of emotion— _What’s best for him? What does he need?_

“What happened to me?” Bucky’s voice floats easily, like silence means nothing to him.

The question rolls into a black ball in the pit of Steve’s stomach. What could he tell Bucky, really? Just numbers and lists and missions; that wasn’t what had happened. Just crumbs for a starving man.

He draws a breath and begins. _I will be your memory._ He starts with Bucky falling off the train. Words thick in his throat and he struggles to tell the story instead of bleeding out a long, rambling apology. He tells him everything he knows, every memorized detail. He tells Bucky what he knows about the conditioning, the cryo—voice cracking, eyes on the table—the political battle to own him, the missions, and finally, the fall of Hydra, and of SHEILD. Bucky is silent and still. 

The sun rises and pierces the glass, blinding gold over everything. The woman leaves them in peace and breakfasters start to fill in. The clatter of plates and murmured conversations are a soft cloak of sound.

Steve tells him about the last time he saw him, their fight on the helicarrier, with pleas behind his words. He glosses over the details, the violence and the pain, his begging and his sweet release, dead weight in the water. Steve explains his mission and why it mattered, he says it’s all over now and the warmth in his eyes says— _I forgive you._

Steve stops abruptly. He doesn’t tell him about the last few weeks, about the search and the dreams—because that’s Steve’s story, not Bucky’s. He waits for Bucky to speak.

“What about the rest of it?”

Steve blinks.

“What came before?” Bucky’s voice is cautious.

“Oh,” Steve searches his face and smiles— _you were my—._ He pauses, “We met when we were five.” Steve winds his way through their childhood and somehow this is harder to talk about than the torture. Steve tells him stories, out of order and full of tangents. Jokes, important dates, big fights, dreams, plans, awkward double dates. He can’t possibly tell him everything he remembers because he remembers everything. Their intertwined lives bright in his mind. 

And when he laughs Bucky’s face softens. He’s in the middle of a story about the time they got caught playing on the school roof, when Bucky’s lips quirk into a smile.

“And you told the Principal that we were rescuing a bird with a broken wing,” Steve chuckles at the memory and his heart lifts when Bucky does the same. A soft puff of air over his lips.

“And then a dead bird fell out of nowhere,” Bucky’s quiet voice fills the gap.

“Yes! Right at your feet!” Steve’s grinning bigger than he has in years, eyes bright. _He remembers._

“And I said, ‘I guess he didn’t make it,” Steve erupts with laughter, booming and joyful, head tipped back. Bucky laughs too, much quieter, eyes never leaving Steve’s face, “You laughed just like that, too. Gave us both away.”

Steve chokes out an admission, convulsing with laughter, eyes watering. He could do this forever. He could spend another lifetime re-telling the one they’d both left behind. He forgets the pain of illness, the tension of diverging paths, the pride that wounded them both, and tells him beautiful, perfect stories.

Steve tells Bucky about his own enlistment, and how Steve failed the physical over and over. Bucky’s eyes darken. He tells him about the serum and the stage act and coming to Italy. He tells him about jumping out of a plane, sneaking into that Hydra base, and finding him in the lab. _About how the first time he went to war, it was for him._ How they stumbled out of that hell in each others’ arms, how they marched back to camp side-by-side. _How the first fight he ever won was for Bucky’s life._

He tells Bucky about the Howling Commandos. He tells him all the war stories they should have been telling for years, about great triumphs and huge scares. How they laughed around a fire in the middle of nowhere. _How good it felt just to be together._ Then he returns to the train. Doesn’t tell the story again. Too painful now, against the backdrop of childhood and victory and unity. Too bitter an end.

The waitress, sensing an opportunity, approaches the table. They have sat there for hours without ordering, but she seems unfazed. The diner has emptied out again in the lull between morning and noon. Steve sits up a bit straighter and orders a huge meal: two full breakfasts and most of a lunch.

He gives an encouraging smile when Bucky simply says, “I’ll have the same.”

She walks away and Bucky fills the silence, “I killed more men for you than I did for Hydra.”

Steve blinks.

“47. I killed more than that with you, right?”

 

“Yes.” It leaves Steve’s lips as a whisper.

 

Bucky looks out the window. He seems content. 

“I went to your museum exhibit.” His profile cuts a striking line in the sunshine.

“Oh yeah? Do you— What did you think?”

Bucky meets his eyes suddenly, dark intensity, “It was—strange. Familiar. Didn’t expect to see myself,” he blinked away, “Like going to my own funeral, for a life I didn’t know I had.” Lips twist into a dark smile.

“And then you came to find me.” Steve finishes. He is struck by how easy this is. Bucky is here, sitting across from him, in 2014. _And he remembers._ Asking questions, looking just as he always has. Somehow he found himself, didn’t need any help.

The waitress brings the food in three trips. Plates push plates aside until the table is covered. Bucky’s eyes are bright and curious. He waits until the woman has turned away to bring his hands above the table, skin and metal. They eat in silence. Both take their coffee strong and black.

When every plate is clean, Steve stacks them at the end of the table. The waitress brings the check and Steve takes it wordlessly. Determined to pay— _Does Bucky even have money? Should I try to give him some?_

“Thanks.” Bucky meets his eyes with something open, uncertain, fragile. He is already moving to stand.

“Of course, I— What are you, um—,” Steve stumbles to ask, _will you come home with me?_ “Where are you headed—now?”

A touch of concern on his brow, Bucky pauses but says nothing.

“If you need a place to stay, you can stay with me.”

Surprise and alarm in Bucky’s eyes.

“We’ll put the couch cushions on the floor,” Steve ventures and Bucky smiles. _He remembers._ Steve’s heart jumps again. _Don’t go._

“I’ll see you around,” Bucky stands.

“Oh—well, can I take you—” he grasps for something, _shopping? dinner? some place to sit and talk so I can watch you smile?_ “to get some—new clothes?”

Bucky laughs, eyes crinkling, “Just got these yesterday.” His eyebrow quirks up, that same cocky look. So familiar and out of nowhere and devastating as a car crash. Steve gapes and blushes. No matter who Bucky meant to charm, some pretty nurse or a girl at the dance hall, it always worked best on Steve.

“Tuesday. 5 o’clock,” Bucky turns toward the door. His body moves just like it always has. Swagger and square shoulders.

“Where?” Steve manages.

“Here,” and he’s already at the door.

“Bucky,” Steve calls out, urgency in his voice that makes Bucky pause, “Why’d you save me?”

Something flashes in Bucky’s eyes. Something dark and cold and final. Something Steve had only seen once before, his head tipped back against cold metal, cornered and out of bullets. Bucky turns, pushes open the door, and walks away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> They've found each other! Now the superhero angst can be begin in earnest. :)
> 
> I hope you all thought of Chris Evans' famous left-boob-touch-laugh when Steve lost it: http://officialchelso.tumblr.com/post/83416112402/why-does-chris-evans-always-grab-his-left-boob-when-he


	6. If This is Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Your heart is weak and foolish. It does not know what your hands have done. But you are tired. And if this is life—you wake up and wake up and wake up—then there will always be time to run. You drop to the sidewalk, peer out from the alley, and turn right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> Help I'm Alive by Metric  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoK63Bk7pgw

Three steps out the door. Sunshine on your skin. Turn the corner and sink into the wall. Your knees crumple and you brace a hand against the asphalt. Your heart pounds in your chest.

Bucky sinks into the shadows. Metal hand grips the fire escape and he swings easily up onto its decaying platform. He crouches, shoulders against the brick. Close your eyes and breathe.

Curled away from the sun, he has nearly forgotten why he came. Why he followed Steve for blocks, wondering how to approach him, before dropping squarely in his path. Why he sat down in that diner and listened and listened. 

_He talks about my life like it was his own. How did I forget him?_

Knowing the Winter Soldier’s story completed the fractured picture in his memory, but it made little difference. Gave him a reason for the dissonance in his mind, but didn’t cure it. It was still his hands that did those things, the same hands that tremble now.

The past is a story and the present is what we see and hear and feel. It comforts us to know the story, but it doesn’t change our world.

Bucky is grit and blades and shadows. He can see the world, move through it, hold it in his hands, but he is not made of the same stuff. Steve doesn’t seem to know that. He speaks with fondness lifting the corners of his eyes, sympathy in his voice. He struggled with words he thought would hurt him— _torture, force, kill, break._

But the words that hurt were the soft ones. The jokes he told and the too detailed stories. _How did he remember it all?_ And his laugh. His joyous, bubbling laugh—out of nowhere, turning the world upside down. So Bucky laughed too, and felt more human in that moment than ever before.

Bucky can be a shadow. He can survive out of sight and never be lost. But to be a person? That is a gaping unknown. The way Steve’s face fell when Bucky weighed how many people he had killed. That’s what it means to be human and Bucky does not have that. It is much harder to feel, and to cause another to feel? _The way he looks at me._ That is a tremendous responsibility.

Bucky starts when the diner door swings open. From his perch, he can see Steve step out into the light. He hesitates, and turns right.

So make your choice. You came for answers and you got them. Run and start over. Run and survive. Do what you know how to do and leave living to those who were born for it.

Or chase the life that was yours a lifetime ago. Chase the man you are not anymore. Chase the lightness in your chest when he speaks to you. The glint in his eye when he talks about you two together. The way his body angles toward you, protective and close. The way he flushes and stares when you smile at him.

Your body fights itself and you know there is no choice, really, to be made. Your heart is already following him down the sidewalk. It is running up behind him, grabbing his shoulder, spinning him around, and falling into his arms. It is weeping on his neck and begging to come home.

Your heart is weak and foolish. It does not know what your hands have done. But you are tired. And if this is life—you wake up and wake up and wake up—then there will always be time to run. You drop to the sidewalk, peer out from the alley, and turn right.

 

* * *

 

Steve walks for miles. As the city falls away, Bucky drops back farther and farther. He weaves, staying close to trees and buildings, but Steve never looks back.

They arrive at a quiet suburban home in the late afternoon. Bucky ducks behind a truck to watch him dig out his keys and unlock the door.

Lights flick on, muffled sounds from inside the walls, and Bucky surveys the area. There is an unlocked truck parked nearby, and an unattended shed three houses down. But he wants to be closer.

Bucky watches the windows until the sun sets. Through the blinds, he sees the silhouettes of two men, one is clearly Steve and the other moves like a soldier.

He feels an inexplicable pang of jealousy. Remember, you are not like them.

He scales a neighboring house, gripping the windowsills, trying not to leave marks. He crouches on the roof and leaps, landing on the roof’s northwest edge, where he thinks he is least likely to be heard.

Bucky stalks carefully around the roof under the cover of darkness. He lays flat on his stomach and peers over the gutters at each edge. Two bedrooms in use, one sits empty. The window in the kitchen is cracked and he can hear two voices in conversation.

He lets his head hang over the gutter. Cups his hand around his ear to funnel the sound and lets his body settle. Heart rate slows, sniper’s breath. He is completely still.

“Well, yeah, I don’t know. I mean, he seemed—fine? Not completely fine, but a lot better.”

“Better?”

“Yeah. Just quiet. And he laughed.”

A long pause.

“So where’d he go?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you’re meeting him again?”

“Yeah. Tuesday.”

The other man laughs.

“What?”

“You gonna make it that long?”

Another pause, then, “You think he’ll run again?”

“Was he ever running?”

It is Sunday night. Bucky sleeps on the roof.

 

* * *

 

Steve rises early— _as he always has_ —and Bucky wakes to the sounds of him making breakfast in the kitchen. His body is alert as soon as he wakes. He eases onto his knees and shrinks back onto the roof. The two men emerge together in t-shirts and loose fitting pants. Bucky studies the other man’s face as they jog off, and again when they return.

He remembers thrashing this man to the deck of the helicarrier. Fist closing around his wing. Strong kick right to his chest, off the edge to certain death. Is there anything in Steve’s life that you have not broken?

Steve leaves again before lunch, alone and in a car. Bucky considers following him, hot-wiring the truck and— but he decides to wait. He passes the time listening to the other man move around the house. The man makes a few phone calls, all to family and none that mention Steve.

Steve returns with three armloads of plastic bags.

“What’s all this?! Is he moving in?”

“I don’t know!”

“You gotta give him space, Steve.”

“I am giving him space! I have no idea where he is.”

“Yeah, but you want him here.”

“Of course I do,” voice falling quiet.

They are so close, conversation fluid. One finishing thoughts the other begins. Bucky’s chest is tight. He tracks the cadence of Steve’s steps to the unused bedroom. He hears Steve pulling up the blinds and doesn’t dare look below. Two hours later the rustling stops and Steve pads down the stairs. Bucky leans over the edge.

The room is full of human touches. New sheets, blanket in a familiar shade of blue. The closet is open and Bucky can see new clothes hanging inside. Three pairs of black leather boots lined up underneath. A spread of new things arranged perfectly on the dresser. Toothbrush, toothpaste, too many tubes of things Bucky has never seen, a familiar straight-edge razor, and a thinner one with a plastic handle.

It is meant to feel like home, and it does. Immediately. A home he doesn’t remember. Bucky takes in each detail of the room again. He considers coming in through the window. He can always slip away again if anyone approaches.

Instead, he moves to other side of the house to listen to Steve talk over dinner, listen to him laugh.

“Do you think he meant am or pm?”

“What?”

“He just said to meet him at 5 o’clock,”

“Are you serious.”

“I met him at 4:30 yesterday morning.”

“What is wrong with you guys?”

“I just don’t want to miss him.”

“You mean you’re not gonna sit in that diner all day tomorrow? Just to be safe?”

The other man teases Steve in a familiar way, maybe Bucky spoke that way once, too.

It is Monday night. Bucky sleeps on the roof.

 

* * *

 

_“Hey,” his voice is sleepy and surprised._

_“Hey,” Bucky returns._

_Steve sits up in his bed._

_“Thanks for the—for everything,” Bucky manages._

_“Oh, of course—you’re welcome,” Steve’s face glows just the same as it did at the diner, “Is everything okay?”_

_“I don’t remember how to do this.” Bucky offers bluntly. He holds up the straight edge razor._

_“Oh,” Steve is already standing up, “Let me show you.” He treads toward the bathroom and Bucky follows._

_Steve flicks on the light and shuts the door behind them. He lifts the faucet, two fingers in the water’s flow, and Bucky watches his face in the mirror._

_Sleep flees quickly and their eyes adjust to the light faster than they should._

_“Can you sit here?” Steve gestures to the bathroom counter. Bucky sits down gingerly, unsure if it will hold his weight. Steve drapes a towel over his lap and tucks another around his shoulders. He runs his fingers through Bucky’s hair, tucking it behind his ears, and Bucky’s eyelids flicker shut._

_Bucky swallows and opens them again to see Steve preparing a lather._

_He does it the way they used to, the way Bucky would remember. Does remember?_

_Steve spreads the white foam over his face and settles three fingers along his jaw to steady him. Bucky doesn’t breathe. Steve draws the razor along his skin, expert touch, and their faces are so close._

 

* * *

 

He wakes to the sound of a door knob twisting. Eyes snap open and muscles tense.

Bucky waits for silence to settle before peering over the roof edge. Steve is laying on the bed he made for him, back to the window.

Bucky pushes up onto his elbows. He had a mission in the fall of 1962, a tall woman with straight blond hair, hotel room kill from a rooftop. He cannot remember the target’s name.

 

* * *

 

The sun rises on Tuesday and Bucky is already awake. He has not eaten since the diner, but is not hungry. Bucky waits until the pair leave on their run before falling softly to the grass. He climbs into the unlocked truck and looks at his face in the visor’s mirror. 

He brushes the hair from his face, traces the lines under his eyes. The two men return, one drenched in sweat, the other unchanged.

Just walk to the door, three quick knocks, wait for it to open. When Steve sees you, eyes bright with surprise, smile already tugging at his lips, just say, 

“I’ll stay.”

It is that easy.

Easy as squeezing a bullet from the chamber. You are already poised, finger on the trigger, stance still, target in your sights. A bullet to rip through his world with your violence. 

 

* * *

 

It is 3 o’clock and Bucky’s hand rests on the door handle. Move now, before he leaves to meet you in the city.

Suddenly, the front door swings open and the man with wings runs to the car, Bucky watches in the rearview mirror. He jerks open the trunk and yells back toward the house.

Steve blows out the door, bag and shield in hand. That shield. Bucky’s heart kicks at the reminder, the last time he saw it. He knows so little about this man he can’t stop watching. The life Steve has now— _people, purpose, place_ —is more than paragraphs in a museum. And Bucky has even less than that; just a story told at diner and a bag full of knives.

_But you want him here. Of course I do._

Steve throws everything into the car, talking loud and fast at the man behind the wheel. Bucky is too far away to hear but his mind reads Steve’s face reflexively. Deeply concerned, determined the way it was before battle. They are not headed to the diner. Steve pauses and looks up, eye brows knit, eyes searching. He slams into the passenger seat and the car screams away.

Bucky sits in the truck until the sun goes down. He stares at his reflection in the narrow mirror until it is so dark he can only see the wet glint of his own eyes. The car has not come back.


	7. Lose Your Footing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam toes his boot against Steve’s. “You gonna reschedule that appointment?”

Steve sits in the back of a black, unmarked helicopter, staring at his boots. It has been a long two days in Bucharest. ****

They’re here, just him and Sam strapped into seats that flank the chopper’s body, because Steve requested it. Said they needed to get home as quickly as possible, so Fury got him the fastest flight over the Atlantic and a helicopter back to D.C.

Sam watches him the way he always does. Casually, like his mind is elsewhere.

Steve pictures Bucky sitting alone in the diner, brim of his hat over his eyes, back to the wall. Silent and still. Watching people pass outside the window. He stays for hours. Until the sun sets. Then he stands and leaves, disappearing into the city’s shadows again.

Sam toes his boot against Steve’s. “You gonna reschedule that appointment?” he asks, cryptic because their headsets are linked with the rest of the crew.

“Don’t know if I can.”

The blades beat the air outside and Steve drops his head in his hands, elbows resting on his knees. Another missed date.

His shoulder aches from a four-hour old fall. The mission hadn’t been terrible, but enough to batter him. Fury had been compromised in Europe, running from Hydra agents he meant to find first. Natasha is off the grid and Steve and Sam are the only other people who know he’s alive. Couldn’t say no.

Couldn’t trade men’s lives to meet Bucky again. Even if he considered it for a moment. Even if his stomach was a pit of worry as they flew halfway around the world. Even if he replayed that diner conversation in his mind when they were in position, ready to strike. Even backed into a corner, ragged gash on his arm, shield twenty feet away, he thought of the last man he fought instead of the one desperately trying to stab him now.

No use regretting. This is who you are; not entirely your own man. You traded your body for a weapon, and you know what weapons are made for. You go where you are needed most. A better soldier than a friend.

The helicopter slows and drops over a hidden pad at DCA. Privacy for people in nice suits and new shoes, whose phones never stop ringing. Sam and Steve step out in civilian clothes that cover bruises and scrapes, wearing expressions that cover everything else.

They drive home in silence and Steve’s mind spins in a familiar worried rhythm. _What do I do now?_ If he starts to walk again, would Bucky come for him? _Can he trust me again? He needed me and I just disappeared._ Should have left a note.

Mid-day heat envelops them as they step out of the car, onto the driveway. Steve feels a headache pushing in and he walks to the door with his eyes down. Fumbles in his bag for his keys, clicks open the lock and steps into the shadows. The blinds are always closed.

Sam steps in behind him, mumble-announces something about a shower, and pads up the stairs. Steve is still. The weight of being back here, two days late and without him, is unexpectedly heavy. Steve shuts the door with his heel and slouches back on the wood paneling. _Shit._ It feels like starting over.

The headache is blooming full and sharp at the back of his head. Steve pushes away from the door, heads to the kitchen for a glass of water. Turns the corner—

Black boots, brand new, on the tile. Dark canvas falls stiff and crisp over the laces. Steve’s head snaps up. _It’s him._

Adrenaline floods, surprise hits like a wall. Sudden and bruising. Steve’s face melts from shock to relief and Bucky’s lips twitch into a small smile.

Steve breathes out and shakes his head, eyebrows rising. He searches for the right words to apologize but his tongue is unprepared. Didn’t expect to get the chance. He huffs a small laugh and his heart is lifting out of his chest. It’s like getting him back all over again.

This is when you begin to lose your footing. When it does not even occur to you to ask how he found you. Why he is in your kitchen. Because he is wearing the clothes that you bought him. New boots on his feet. And his face is cleanly shaven. You realize, heady and hopeful, that he has been living here. In _his_ room. His eyes are gentle with that curious smile. You stare at him and forget to speak.

“I’ll stay,” Bucky says quietly and looks at the floor, “If you want me to.”

Steve’s chest convulses in a disbelieving laugh before he can stop it. Gives in to everything he feels and can’t name. He falls forward and crushes Bucky into a hug. He is stiff in Steve’s arms—not just a little resistance, his entire body tenses to alert. But he feels so good and he is here with Steve and he is staying. And Steve cannot help himself.

He holds onto Bucky so the world can’t rip them apart again. Holds him tightly in the silence, arms around leather over skin and unyielding metal. Bucky eases a bit with each breath until his muscles relax and his breath is quiet. His arms are trapped under Steve’s, but he leans forward, rests his chin lightly on Steve’s shoulder, and that is more than enough.

 

* * *

 

When Sam comes down the stairs, loose t-shirt and loose cotton pants, he hears two voices in the kitchen. He is not surprised.

He hangs back in the hall, listening to the easy pace of Steve’s voice and the occasional quiet one that speaks only in questions and answers. He pads into the doorway. Steve looks up and the man at the table visibly tenses. 

“I’ma go run some errands. Text if you need anything,” Sam nods at each of them like this is normal. Steve says thank you with his eyes and gives him a small smile. The man with dark hair just stares.

 

* * *

 

Empty dishes stack up in the sink and Steve is still cooking. Bucky eats everything so Steve empties out the cabinets, cooking anything he finds. He sets down another plate of noodles, this one topped with dried herbs and a handful of raisins. Bucky eats it the same way he ate the first three, eyes down, hand carefully twisting his fork. He chews thoughtfully, taking the time to taste.

Steve watches him from the stove. Eyes roaming, taking him in. The curve of his spine, the way his boot rests sideways, on its edge on the floor. Time passes and it means nothing.

“What did you eat while we were gone?”

“Um—just, whatever I found in here.”

Steve chuckles and raises an eyebrow, “Like what?”

“I had some of that,” Bucky points to the mayonnaise on the counter. 

“What, just a spoonful of mayo?”

“Yeah. And—some jam. And I had a bag of frozen peas.”

Steve is eyeing him, lips curling up, “Did you cook them?”

“No,” Bucky replies, face open, “Are you supposed to cook them?”

Steve’s laugh escapes, leaping from his upturned face toward the ceiling. Hand on his stomach. Bucky laughs too, a quiet chuckle. Laughing with Steve more than laughing at anything in particular.

And it could be tragic but it’s not. How strange and new and old, foreign and familiar it is. Bucky is not who he was but he is not less. He sits at the table, giving Steve quiet, unsure smiles, eating jam and mayonnaise and frozen peas like that’s normal. Somehow, it is. It is perfect.

 

* * *

 

After a few days of hiding in a shuttered house, Steve drives them to the mall— _I told you we’d get some new clothes, so_ — _and I know I already got you some, but_ —and it seems like a safe first step. 

Bucky’s been settling into this new life slowly; every day a bit more at ease. He talks more, smiles faster, watches the windows less. He and Sam have even exchanged a few words. Bucky didn’t flinch at the idea of leaving the house and Steve is the anxious one on the drive over. He just wants this to go well— _what am I afraid of?_

They arrive with the mall walkers and they’re way too covered up for the summer heat. Soft crunch of boots on asphalt through the parking lot. Gentle whoosh of chilled air through the door.

Seeing Bucky out in the world is encouraging and nerve-wracking at once. He’s curious but cautious. Looks up at a passing plane, runs his hand over the blooming bushes by the door, studies the vending machines by the wall. Then a security guard drops something, a loud crack echoes against the tile and glass, and Bucky hardens. He doesn’t jump. His eyes narrow in a flash and his face closes off. Head lowered, in shadow.

It’s not fear and it’s not anger. And when he realizes there is no threat, he blinks down at the ground. His shoulders tense and he fights his body back to neutral. A quiet battle that Steve wishes he could fight instead.

But the most striking change is how Bucky shows everything on his face. In Brooklyn, he was confident and proud. Too proud to show confusion or embarrassment. Too proud to feel, it seemed sometimes. But now he is nearly transparent. Confusion, contentment, curiosity, exhaustion all flit over his features.

Steve stands a little too close and finds excuses to touch him—light fingertips on his shoulder, tapping his hand to get his attention, bumping his hip as they walk. He guesses that Bucky is armed.

Steve guides them through a few stores, holding out shirts and pants for Bucky to see. Bucky touches the clothes as they’re presented, but says little. He seems content just to walk around, a half-step behind Steve, so they do.

When they walk by a wall of sneakers, Bucky pauses.

“I don’t understand these.”

“The shoes?”

“Yeah, this stuff,” he indicates the foam sole on a pair of Nikes.

“Oh, yeah it’s pretty comfortable. It’s—like a cushion.”

Bucky’s face pulls in a new way, a little skeptical, “Doesn’t look like it’d last long."

Steve’s already smiling at this easy exchange, “What do you mean?”

Bucky pulls his metal hand from his jacket pocket, the first time he’s had it out all day. He lifts the shoe with his right hand and closes an engineered finger and thumb around the foam heel. A servo whirs quietly as the fingers compress, effortlessly condensing the foam to a thin line. Bucky releases his grip and repeats the action. He turns to Steve with one eyebrow raised, mouth cocked, as if to say— _See? Flimsy._ Steve can’t contain a laugh. Seems to happen a lot lately.

Bucky smiles at his response and squeezes the foam a few more times, which only makes Steve laugh harder. He drops the shoe in its place and Steve claps him on the back, hand lingering.

When a salesman approaches a little too quickly, they move like one unit to put Steve between him and Bucky. Steve is struck by how familiar it feels, to move quickly and with purpose around him. To anticipate each others’ movements. Everything is different, the world strange, their bodies altered, but this dance with Bucky is exactly the same: moving as one, watching each others’ backs.

Steve knows Bucky is already leaning on him, letting him fill the gaps in his mind, and there is no better feeling than having his trust. He knows Bucky can disappear, but chooses to stay.

 

* * *

 

Steve makes mug after mug of tea. He goes through every flavor in the cupboard twice. Each one finished with a splash of milk. Steve delivers them to the kitchen table with a steady hand and Bucky asks, “What kind?”

“Raspberry.”

Sip. “Tastes like cranberry.”

Sip, chuckle. “Yeah it does.”

They sit and drink and talk about little things and big ones.

Steve tells him about the last couple years and Bucky tells him everything he knows about his left arm. They circle around questions neither is ready to ask or answer. Bucky retells remembered bits of stories and Steve fills in the gaps. Most are from before the war and all of them were made with Steve. There isn’t a single story he can’t complete.

Bucky’s voice reflects the man behind it. A patchwork of instinct and memory, healing into something more complete. That familiar tone, the same accent he’s always had, comes back effortlessly. He uses some words he’d never used before and his sense of humor is different. He’s a little rougher and surprisingly blunt.

The more he talks, the more things Steve thinks of to share with him. He adds to his mental list of places and foods and movies and things to try. Things to do together.

 

* * *

 

It is 3 in the morning when they go upstairs. Steve stands at the sink in the bathroom they share, brushing his teeth and staring at Bucky’s toothbrush. _He lives here._ The glow of having him close hasn’t faded.

When he opens the door, Bucky is lurking in the hall. He’s barefoot and his jacket is gone. A little less guarded, a little more at home. An awkward moment, eyes locked, and Steve says, “See you in the morning,” as lightly as he can.

“Yeah,” and Bucky returns a small smile.

Steve closes his door softly, muffling the sound of Bucky running the tap in the bathroom. He lays down on his bed, fully clothed, and listens. Takes in the sounds of Bucky moving around the bathroom, into his bedroom, and settling to stillness. Steve has thought about checking in on him at night. _I can always say I thought I heard something._ But he knows Bucky would wake instantly. So he lays awake and replays the day instead. It is his way of saying— _I trust you to be here in the morning._

 

* * *

 

When Steve wakes, he heads straight to the hall, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, tripping down the stairs. Every morning he finds Bucky already at the kitchen table. One slat of the blinds pushed up so he can see the backyard, strip of morning light on his face.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

They begin another day together. And Steve forgets who he is. He forgets what he does, that he will be needed, that he is a ten-second phone call away from racing out the door. He forgets and puts on a pot of water for tea. Forgets and sits down at the table. Forgets and smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys I am in D.C. right now for a Very Professional Work Thing and I'm just: heeeee! location research!! 
> 
> So enjoy some genuine, first-hand D.C. facts in this fic. Only A+ stuff for you all.


	8. We

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What are we doing here? Living in a stranger’s house, orbiting around each other like nothing else exists.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rating has been upgraded to Mature for descriptions of violence. It's a fuzzy line but I think we've crossed it.
> 
> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> Fineshrine by Purity Ring  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muL0Q6z0TWo

4 am. Black socks on linoleum. Low voices so they won’t wake Sam. There is no such thing as wasting time.

Neither of them needs much sleep, so they spend a lot of early morning hours in the kitchen. Steve won’t stop feeding him, so they’re usually eating. When he can convince Steve to let him cook for once, he makes the only thing he’s sure he knows how to make. Oatmeal.

Bucky watches the pot while it cooks, floating in a gap between instinct and memory, waiting for one to take over and tell him when it’s done. Steve watches him with a look that’s too warm; it makes his chest tight.

What are they doing? _What are we doing here?_ Living in a stranger’s house, orbiting around each other like nothing else exists.

 

* * *

 

It’s raining so Steve takes them to the grocery store—“Have you been yet?—Okay—Yeah—Trust me, it’ll take all day.”

Produce and prepared foods takes an hour and half. Bucky picks up one of everything. Even things he recognizes, even things they’ve eaten in the past week. _Why not?_

Steve’s pushing the half-full cart along, hovering a half-step behind, answering Bucky’s quiet questions—“What’s this?—Is that new?—What does it taste like?”

Bucky is two aisles into the dry goods, letting his eyes drift over every package on every shelf. He keeps his left hand in his jacket pocket. Pulls boxes from shelves, turns them over, reads the labels, weighs them in his hand, and sets them lightly in the cart. Eyes flick up to Steve, who is always looking back at him.

In the cereal aisle, Bucky is trying to choose between five boxes that seem identical. Steve’s warning him that everything here will be sweeter than he’s expecting.

Bucky sees a rush of blue and his stomach drops. His body responds before his mind can fit the pieces together. A little girl, no older than six, in a ruffled blue dress. Smiling and hanging on a shopping cart.

_There was a girl. Moscow, 1986. There was a girl. Shaking under the bed._

Bucky spins away, blinking at the tile.

_His metal fist around her arm. Dragging that tiny weight. Screaming shrill in the hotel room._

Bucky is kneeling on the tile. Steve is gripping his shoulder, asking questions, but Bucky can’t hear him.

_Unsheathe the knife. Too easy. Sickly silence. Blood seeping into ruffled blue._

Bucky is on his feet. Running. Out the door, around the building. Burying his face against the sun-bleached cinderblocks. Crouched, curled in on himself, and shaking.

Just wait. Just wait.

The blackness fades. You gasp your lungs to life again. The world returns to focus. Nearby cars, the rattle of shopping carts, distant chirp of birds. And Steve, arms wrapped tight around you. Whispering, “Just wait. It’ll pass. I’m here.”

He is always so close. How is he always so close to you? Touching or as near as he can get. He is tied to you like a shadow. Or perhaps you are his shadow. 

Bucky pulls his head from his hands. He turns, so his back rests against the wall, and Steve meets his eyes. 

“Steve,” suddenly he feels he needs to know. _He needs to know what I’ve done_ , “There was a girl,” his voice cracks, “in Moscow.”

Steve just listens, pain sharp in his eyes.

“I killed her,” it is barely a whisper, “I slit her throat.”

Steve doesn’t react and it stings. He should pull back, deny it. _He expects this from me._ The hurt must show in his eyes because Steve is shaking his head, touching his arm, “It wasn’t you, Buck.”

“It was. My hands.”

“Don’t think like that.”

“You wouldn’t have done it.”

Steve blinks. His voice is a little sharper, “Bucky. You can’t think like this. You survived. That’s more than anyone could have asked.”

“I worked alone.” Bucky’s brows knit. No good man would kill a child. “I could’ve just walked away.”

“You know it wasn’t that easy,” Steve’s hand is on his knee, “Escape wasn’t an option.”

Bucky is silent.

Steve’s voice is gentle but firm. “We’ve got another 70 years to live; you gonna spend it regretting a nightmare?”

Bucky searches his face. Steve waits for an answer.

_We._

 

* * *

 

‘We’ keeps popping up. Steve has abandoned I and me for us and we. Every time it makes your heart skitter. Already your world is narrowing. Why would you ever want to leave D.C.? Folding in on itself. Why even leave this house? Shrinking down to just Steve. Have you made a choice or are you taking advantage of his kindness?

Steve makes plans for October. _We’ll go to Boston._ Bucky says nothing. _We always talked about jumping the train._ That’s four months away. _Now we can just go. We’ll drive if you like._ Four months is a long time. _And stop along the way. Would you like that?_

Bucky replays the conversation when he sits in the kitchen, waiting for Steve to come downstairs. Watching the backyard through a gap in the blinds to ease the anxious tug.

_Would you like that?_

But Steve has left before and will leave again. And what will Bucky do? _You wanted to start over._ Is this starting over? You sleep and wake and heal. Are you living now? Your skin sparks when he touches you, heart grips when you hurt him. Is that what you were looking for?

Bucky floats uneasily next to Steve, inconstant shadow. And in his indecision, his heart begins to weave itself with Steve’s. His body learns to move around him. Expect him. Steve has already found the gaps in his mind and filled them with his own memories. The first door opens and you are home.

 

* * *

 

5 am. Slouched in a wooden chair. Steve makes tea like it’s a given. He cycles through the flavors and Bucky likes them all. 

Bucky is wearing sneakers today because a pair appeared outside his door last night. Nikes with a foam sole. Steve’s right, they’re like a cushion. Steve smiles at the shoes and says nothing.

“Hey,” Bucky clears his throat, “Can we go to a bookstore?”

“Yeah!” Steve answers a little too quickly, “Absolutely.”

Bucky nods and sips his tea.

“Do you—Is there anything you’re looking for?”

“No,” Bucky looks up at him.

Steve just nods, “Okay, great.” He smiles.

Steve pulls his laptop to the table and makes a list of twelve book stores. He maps them and gets directions that will take them in a long loop, to every shop and home again. He narrates everything he does for Bucky, who is watching over his shoulder. Bucky knows some of it—understands GPS and algorithms—and the rest flows like water from Steve’s mind to his own. From Steve’s lips to his ears.

The first stop takes four hours. They walk together and Steve pretends to look at the shelves.

Bucky roams the aisles to search his mind. He pulls books out by their spines, flipping them open, scanning a few lines, and replacing them. He tucks an encyclopedic book about planes under his arm, a thin, glossy one with lots of photos of owls, and a novel about an ill-fated Thai monastery. It’s not until he’s handing them to Steve that he realizes the last one is in German— _I can read German? I can read German._

Steve takes them without looking, beaming back at him. Glowing the way he does when Bucky asks for things. Bucky smiles back, almost a reflex now. A twinge of guilt for basking in his attention; but Steve is happy and Bucky’s shoulders are light. It is a new feeling, to know someone is proud of you. Bucky chases it like water for parched lips.

 

* * *

 

He feels himself settling into the routine that Steve has painstakingly built around him. He is sure to wait where Steve is expecting him. He speaks his mind and his words don’t betray him. Times passes and he lets his armor fall, pleased to find something like a person underneath. But under his skin, the conflict between past and present grows. Every past blow returns and the horror deepens.

The bloodstained memories spin and warp in his mind. Most of them as sharp as they have always been. Battlefield after battlefield, kill after kill. Memories like a catalog. But now they feel less anchored. Like he read about them in a book. Like he rode in another’s body. Some remembered fiction he desperately wants to forget.

He hides it from Steve, but not well. He pauses and blinks. His face drops in conversation. Bucky knows the shadows show. But Steve is unshakable. Even gasping breakdowns don’t seem to throw him. But he couldn’t know what it feels like. How dark it is. And he shouldn’t know. How broken you are.

 

* * *

 

Bucky sleeps in his pants and shirt. Resting on top of the covers, feeling exposed. He’s rearranged his room so the bed is as far away from the window as possible. He curls around Steve’s remembered form, laying on this bed while he slept on the roof.

The nightmares come and he kills them off quietly. He wakes panting and nauseous, eyes wide in the dark. Talks himself down, deep breaths, until he is steady. Then slips silently down the stairs and sits in the kitchen until morning. Until Steve comes for him the moment he wakes up.

Horror is the world peeling and melting away, bleeding itself down the drain. Hell burns bright and vicious in its place. A void where something should be. Like waking up without an arm. 

Bucky does not feel horror when he dreams; it comes in the twilight moments before he wakes. When the void vomits him up again and he remembers. It is only the beauty around him that makes his stomach twist and chest convulse. It is only when he remembers how alive he is. Remembers what it means to kill.

Some nights are worse than others. Tonight, the girl in the blue dress returns and returns. He slits her throat and slits her throat. It is so violent, so depraved, that his mind rips him back from the brink of sleep again and again. When he finally sinks into unconsciousness, no more than two breaths pass before she is screaming in his mind. Tiny chest fighting for breath. His heart kicks and he gasps his eyes open. _She was so afraid. How did I not see she was afraid?_

Bucky leaps from the bed on shaky legs. Open the door, two stumbling steps, open another door, fall on your knees. Vomit into the toilet and feel your body fail. You draw a shallow breath and your stomach heaves, trying to turn itself inside out.

Hands clench on the seat and Steve is there. Soft cotton and heat at Bucky’s back. Steve kneels next to him and draws the hair back from his face. He holds it, one hand cradling the nape of his neck, and runs gentle fingertips through the tangle. Tender comfort in the dark, streetlight shadows through the blinds, two figures huddled like a secret. He is so close.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Bucky.” His voice breaks, “I’m so sorry.” He buries his face in Bucky’s shoulder. And it hurts. Feeling Steve come undone, a dull ache in his chest. Bucky spits bile and draws another breath with burning lungs.

It is getting worse. And now it hurts Steve, too. Bucky vows not to lose it again. _You have to be stronger than this._

 

* * *

 

The call comes. Like they both knew it would. They’re standing in the kitchen, three different kinds of canned green beans open on the counter. A fork resting inside each one.

“How soon?”

Bucky’s chewing silently and Steve paces in the doorway.

“Okay.”

“You’re sure it’s them?”

A long pause and Steve’s eyes flick to Bucky.

“Yeah, I can come now,” his tone deflated.

He hangs up with a nearly silent sigh. His eyes apologize as he says, “I have to go.”

“Now?” Guilt shoots through Bucky’s stomach for the disappointment in his voice.

“Yeah.”

“Okay.” Bucky looks back at the cans. Steve hesitates, pushes off the door frame, and walks away. When he is out of sight, Bucky drops the fork, leans forward with his palms against the counter. He looks at the tile and swallows.

An awkward goodbye at the door and the car headlights flash through the windows as they pull away. The house is silent and Bucky is still. He is surprised to find himself nervous. _Now what?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Didn’t expect Steve’s sugar daddy game to be so strong, but what can I say? He’s a natural.
> 
> Thanks for reading lovelies!


	9. Nothing That Should Be Said

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve sits shirtless on a overturned crate. Staring at the floor. Staring at his hands. Staring at Bucky’s back. He says nothing that should be said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack Suggestion!
> 
> Household Goods by Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_asfZhfTBk

“Hey.” 

Bucky’s low greeting crackling over the line makes Steve’s stomach flop softly. They got him a phone— _just, you know, in case something happens_ —after Steve’s first trip, three days apart after just two weeks together. He had missed him so terribly, a hole in his sternum every morning, making tea in a crackling hotel coffee maker and hoping Bucky did the same.

Steve had thought about getting him a phone before. Had thought about it the first time they sat in the kitchen together. But didn’t want to push him, to make him feel tied down, for fear that he would run. Had thought about getting Sam a landline, but that was even stranger. No one had those now. Just phones you carried like a piece of yourself.

“How’s it going?”

“Rainy. You?”

“Slow.”

They speak in generalities— _it’s enough just to hear your voice._ Bucky asks about his flights and Steve asks what he had for dinner. 

Talking on the phone highlights their slow dance to find a shared language. Bucky uses a mix of words from their past, contemporary phrases, and things Steve isn’t sure anyone has ever said before. He tries to meet Bucky where he is, using the same words, mirroring his tone.

He asks Bucky to add things to the shopping list taped to the fridge. Bucky tells him about an upcoming lunar eclipse he wants to watch, heard about it on the radio. Thursday night. A clever lead-in to the lingering question,

“When are you coming home?”

Steve’s breath hitches. _Just to hear him ask._ This is the fourth mission he’s been on with Bucky at home, but it doesn’t get any easier.

He gives the only answer he has, “As soon as I can.”

 

* * *

 

Black helicopter. Strapped in next to Sam. Shield at his feet. Heart in his throat. Headed home.

Steve texts him on the drive home, which takes far too long. When he opens the front door, Bucky is waiting in the hall. He steps forward and for a fleeting second Steve expects Bucky’s arms around his waist, his face warm against his neck. But he stops just short, eyes bright and close, their hands brush as he takes Steve’s bag. He drops back a half step, pivots on his heel, and disappears down the hall.

Steve crouches to untie his shoes and calm the rush in his veins. He hears the hollow thunk of the washing machine door.

Bucky had seemed really impressed when Steve showed him the machines. Now he does the laundry after every mission. Washes their gloves and holsters by hand. Hangs them to dry in the laundry room. Drops Steve and Sam’s ballistic armor and military-grade clothing in neatly folded piles outside their doors.

Bucky mends tears, slouched on the couch with the floor lamp pulled up behind him. Quick fingers, sharp eyes. Steve is amused and quietly pleased. A strange domestic rhythm, routine from bizarre circumstances. For the two of them, it has always been effortless.

 

* * *

 

_“Steve, what the hell?”_

_“Just leave it, Buck.”_

_“Who did this?”_

_“I said leave it. I’ll mend it tomorrow.”_

_“The hell you will. It’s mostly patches now,” Bucky is glaring at him, concern burning under the ice, “I’ll do it.” A tense pause. “Again.” A half-hearted barb._

_In fact, it’s the third time he’s mended the shirt this week and Steve’s counting on him to do it again. He doesn’t have another unstained shirt and he’s got class tomorrow. He wants to thank him, explain it’s different this time, but pride closes his throat._

_Bucky stitches in silence, knitting the torn edges into a thin seam. He rises, old floor creaking under his boots, and sighs at the sink. He washes the fresh blood and dirt with a careful hand. Pulling the stains to the surface without warping the fragile fabric._

_Steve sits shirtless on a overturned crate. Staring at the floor. Staring at his hands. Staring at Bucky’s back. He says nothing that should be said._

 

* * *

 

Bucky reappears, meeting Steve in the kitchen and asks for more Kevlar thread. Without SHIELD to outfit them, they use what they have and try to make it last. Fury always has a full arsenal waiting for them, but never new armor. Always has been more focused on offense.

Steve suspects Bucky pulls the clothes from his arms, shutting himself away in the laundry room, so he can check them for blood stains. Or torn fabric that remembers wounds his skin has already forgiven. A silent mission report of all the things Steve will never tell him.

 

* * *

 

Bucky is always a bit rough when Steve gets home. He has nightmares that night, three that Steve can hear, and he worries how bad the dreams must be when Bucky sleeps here alone.

Bucky fights them off with a ferocity that makes Steve ache from the inside out. _Can you pull those secrets out from behind shadowed eyes?_ Steve imagines that the missions are harder on him, reminders of his past, of darker times spent alone. He imagines that seeing the bloodstained clothes and jagged gashes (and even bullet holes) makes things worse. But there’s no avoiding it. This is who he is. Steve does the right thing; he kills some men to save others.

So he sits in the hall. Giving up sleep like some wordless apology. For the guns in his room, the body armor in the car, the shield that’s never out of reach. Listening for noises behind Bucky’s door. He seems to sleep silently and wake in an instant, gasping and choking on shadows. Bucky’s always up and out the door before Steve can come running in. He flees his room, the prison in his dreams, plunging down the stairs without a sound, and they sit in the kitchen. Bucky breathes and Steve makes tea.

Steve knows that he sleeps with his clothes on. Curled up without a blanket. He knows he won’t sleep near the window. And he’s searching for a way to invite Bucky to sleep in his room. Or in his bed. Just to be close, like they used to. For heat and maybe more. 

So he can be there the moment he wakes, screaming into consciousness from wherever his mind goes at night. So he can hold him through it all instead of falling to his knees at Bucky’s back, holding his hair while his body heaves and empties itself, or chasing him to the kitchen and pulling him into a shaky embrace.

Silence in the moonlit hallway. Searching his mind for the words.

 

* * *

 

“What’s this?” Bucky taps the glass panel on the wall.

“Oh,” Steve fumbles for the explanation Sam gave him a few weeks ago, “it’s for the lights. Doesn’t work very well. If you wave your hand the right way,” Steve tries a tentative gesture and nothing happens, “Hm, well it’s supposed to dim them.” He swipes through the air a couple more times, slower then faster, closer to the panel and further away.

Bucky raises an eyebrow, mouth amused, “You sure about that Rogers?”

Steve huffs a small, bewildered laugh, “Yeah, that’s what Sam said.” The lights finally respond to his efforts by shutting off completely. Steve tries again, nothing. Tries again, and the lights come on to full brightness.

Bucky is laughing now, leaning against the wall, eyes dancing over Steve’s face, “You suck at this.” Wording that Steve has heard before but never spoken. His mind files it away to try out later.

Bucky bats away Steve’s hand and tries a few swipes himself. He gets the lights to dim slightly, “Ah!” a pleasant surprise from both their throats. He swipes again, carefully, to dim them further, and the lights switch off.

Now Steve is laughing too. The two of them, puzzling out simple technology. Laughing in the kitchen. Steve thinks of everything he turned away from when he woke up. How he fought to understand and abandoned things he couldn’t master.

He watches Bucky work at the panel, experimenting with different swipes, patient eyes, and wishes they could have woken up together. His patient other half to lead him when he was exhausted, urge calm when he was ready to fight.

But even now, Bucky wasn’t tracing Steve’s steps. He already knew a great deal about the modern world. Always a pleasant surprise to discover something Steve could teach him about. 

A few weeks ago, Steve walked in on Bucky experimenting with the microwave. Bucky was filling plates with dozens of food fragments. A sliver of bread. A dollop of honey. Bite of an apple. A small pool of hot sauce. Microwaving them for a few seconds, and sampling each in turn.

He turned, eyes easy and curious, when Steve walked in, “Why doesn’t this thing cook the inside?”

Steve had laughed and shrugged— _I would have never thought to ask_. And Bucky, before the rise and fall and rise, probably wouldn’t have asked. Too proud to let on he was learning.

Steve had already mastered Googling so he pulled up a quick search and set his phone on the counter. Bucky flicked through, reading snippets of explanations aloud. He used touch screens without hesitation. Navigated through the phone’s interface like he’d done it hundreds of times. _How would he know that?_

What he doesn’t know, he pushes himself to learn. Steve studies him studying the panel on the wall. When Steve would shrug, move-on, work around, give up, Bucky stands still. He drops things mid-task to focus on a single unknown. He lets entire movies play with no audience in the living room when he has found something interesting in the kitchen. 

He fills the gaps meticulously. Drives himself because no one in his world of one pushes him. 

Maybe it’s pride, swelling in a different channel now. Maybe it’s curiosity. Or the hunger to make up for lost time. Maybe it’s the yearn to feel normal; Steve knows that ache. But at least he knows—the world knows—what happened to Steve Rogers, why his world is violence and sacrifice. Not a soul alive knows what happened to Bucky Barnes.

“Hey Buck, what happened to your hand?” Steve’s eyes settle on a ragged scratch twisting from the base of his thumb up his jacket sleeve.

“What?” Bucky stills.

“That scratch.” His fingers rise to meet the scabbing skin but Bucky pulls away, lets his hand drop.

“Oh—I scraped it on the siding.” Bucky’s face closes off, eyes fading, “I was pulling the hose around.”

“Oh.” _Stop. No more questions. Don’t push him._

 

* * *

 

“Thanks,” Bucky’s leaning against the doorframe, “for the shampoo.”

Steve’s face jolts, embarrassingly, at the sound of his voice. He’d brought it back from France. Pine and sage. Left it in their shower with a note. He smiles down at the carrots on the cutting board, “About time I started repaying all those favors.”

Bucky’s voice comes back quiet. Open and a little hesitant, “What favors?”

Steve stops and looks up. The gaps are shrinking and discovering a new one is a surprise. _I guess we haven’t talked about this before_. 

“You used to come home with stuff. Little things. All the time.”

Bucky’s quiet eyes search his face.

“Something you picked up at the docks, some food we couldn’t afford,” Steve chuckled quietly, “Or something I’d had my eye on,” a fond smile and he shakes his head, “but would never buy.”

Bucky hums in reply. He lingers in the kitchen, ducking his head into a cabinet, tossing the carrot trimmings on the counter into the trash, and disappears again.

 

* * *

 

The gifts begin almost immediately. The next morning, a single kiwi fruit outside Steve's bedroom door. Laying there without a note like it fell from the sky. A book of Thai recipes on his seat in the kitchen. A small carton in the fridge with a scrawled note—handwriting he knows like his own—“Duck eggs.”

They’re just as strange and beautiful as everything Bucky does. Nothing neglected, everything seems to deserve a gift. He wakes one morning to three new tubes of toothpaste next to his toothbrush. Each a different flavor.

He pulls on his shoes for a mid-day grocery run to discover that Bucky has slipped cushioned insoles inside.

He opens his wallet in the checkout line to find a Buy 10 Get 1 punch card for the sandwich shop down the street, seven holes already pocking its surface. Each gift a little glimpse of the world through Bucky’s eyes.

When they head upstairs, 1:21 am, Steve to the bathroom, Bucky hangs back. He dips his head under the shower’s spray and sees a single penny, scotch-taped to the tile. “1982” written in ballpoint on the tape. A 32 year-old penny. What a wonderful gift.

Just when Steve feels like they’ve reached equilibrium, it all slides sideways again. Bucky’s shifting, stretching into himself. Exploring the edges of what matters. It seems, breathing in the steam, water on his face, in his eyes, that everything matters.

But it’s days later, when he’s looking through files Fury had a plain-clothes agent deliver that morning, that he sees it. Tucked under the manila folders. Suede cover and off-white pages. Stitched binding. Pristine.

Steve finds him in the kitchen, stirring something on the stove.

“Hey,”

Bucky looks up.

“Thank you.”

Bucky waits.

He continues, much quieter, “you know you don’t have to Buck. With the gifts.”

Bucky says nothing. Of course he knows.

“I haven’t drawn much,” Steve looks at the stove, “since waking up.”

“Maybe you should start again.”

Steve’s eyes rise to his face but Bucky is watching the pot.

“Lot of blank pages to fill.”

“Yeah.” Steve takes a step back, “Thanks.”

“Anything for you, punk.” A mumble and a smirk, eyes still on the stove, but he can probably hear the shock hit Steve’s face. Bucky looks up with a smile. “Hey, close that mouth. I’m not a ghost.”

This is when you start to slip. When you see Bucky as a new man. A bit of old and a heaping of new. Curiosity blooms from the ashes. He shakes in the dark but meets the morning with open eyes. Has peanut butter on orange slices and reads the paper. 

Your body lets go of its balance like it doesn’t matter. The tilt of lost equilibrium in your ears. 

You weren’t made to feel like this. You were born too weak to bear it and made too strong to allow it. Bullet in your gut, blood in your mouth, you were ready to bleed out. You were born a martyr and life slips easy in your chest like water in a glass. The world expects you to pour it out and you will.

Bucky has never taken that for granted. He comes home from hell with a smile and shows you why life’s worth living. I thought you were supposed to be the rock. I thought he was the one healing. But look at you now. You are always falling, trusting the ground to find you.

 

* * *

 

Heat rising from the pavement. Sidewalk trees rustling in the sunshine. Cars idle and inch forward, ducking in and out of narrow side streets. Steve’s weaving between them, bike tilting gently with each turn. Bucky at his back, light hands around his waist.

When he turns he can see, from the corner of his eye, Bucky’s hair whipping in the wind. _Nice day today._ When they were chewing toast at the kitchen table. _Let’s take your bike._ Heart in Steve’s throat— _just nod, just nod_. Bucky tying on his shoes. _Can we go to a record store?_

They step off the bike and Bucky walks to the shop door. Pulls it open and steps aside. He still wears a jacket everywhere but lets his left hand hang by his side. Metal fingers glint in the sunshine. Steve steps past him, into the fluorescent gloom.

Bucky weaves through the aisles. He has a small stack of sleeves by the time a salesman appears, “Hey man, can I help you find anything?”

Steve opens his mouth to reply, used to being their voice, but Bucky speaks first, “Yeah. I want—one of everything.”

The salesman blinks, “one of everything.”

“Yeah, just one of each kind. Of music.” Bucky is unfazed by his confusion.

“Oh,” salesman’s eyes flick to Steve and back to Bucky, “Cool. Do you want some help? Picking them out?”

“Okay.”

The salesman spins a quarter turn, unsure where to start, “Alright, sweet. Well,” he points to the section in front of them, “this is Reggae. Do you—know Reggae?”

“No.”

“Right, cool.” Nodding, adapting, “Well, can’t go wrong with Marley,” he lifts a sleeve and hands it to Bucky. They crawl forward, salesman spouting a clumsy explanation of the genres they pass, things he knows but has never had to say before. Steve’s mind wanders as they walk, until Bucky’s voice pulls him back.

He lifts a CD, “Can you play these?”

Swallow quickly, pull your focus back to the present, “Yeah,” clear your throat.

Bucky sets it on top of the stack cradled between his arm and his chest. The salesman gives them both a look, but they are already past the point of questions, so he picks up where he left off.

They ride back with a crate full of records strapped to the back of the bike, bungee cords pinning it down. It’s not until they’re home, walking through the front hall, that Steve realizes Sam probably doesn’t have a record player.

“Hey Buck, I don’t think we have a record player. Want to go get one?”

“No, we’ve got one,” Bucky’s dropped the crate by the door and he’s disappearing up the stairs.

Steve tosses his keys on the thin table next to the wall. He thinks for a moment— _no, I’m sure Sam doesn’t have one._ He remembers asking a while ago.

He’s about to shout up to Bucky when he circles around the top of the stairs again, carrying a brown box. A record player.

He grins at Steve, that easy, crooked look, and walks past him into the living room.

“We don’t have a player for the little ones, though.”

Steve pulls back the questions on his tongue, “Yeah, Sam’s got one of those.”

Bucky nods and props open the player on the knee-height coffee table. He’s crouching in front of it, setting the needle on a record when Steve asks, “Where did that come from?” One question selected from the dozens his mind has spun and swallowed.

Bucky looks up, “You never knew before.”

“I know, but—I just,” what can you say? _You had a job before. The world’s different now. Are you paying for these with favors, too? You don’t have to Buck. You don’t owe me anything. Just, I don’t know, just—please, just—_

“Hey, I keep my nose clean, alright?” His voice is tipped with something hurt.

Steve smiles. Nods and looks away.

 

* * *

 

_Let’s go for a ride._

“Okay, yeah, let’s go.” _Let’s just ride for hours, no destination._ “What about a park?” _Just ride with you pressed to my back._ “There’s a nice one up in Maryland.” _Wind in our ears so we don’t have to speak._ “No, not too far. It’ll be a nice trip.” _Just let me get a little closer and calm my mind._ “Yeah, let’s bring some water, too.” _You are my anchor, but I don’t think you know it._

They pull up in the unpaved parking lot and the highway roar of wind in their ears falls away. Green everywhere, nothing but green.

They start down a trail without checking the weather-worn map. Winding along a creek bank. Bucky pauses to explain which plants are edible. He hands Steve carefully chosen leaves, new buds, and berries. _How does he know?_ They’re unbelievably bitter but Bucky doesn’t seem to care. He cracks up watching Steve chew on a leaf, face twisting uncontrollably at the taste. His laugh is so light and perfect. It doesn’t even feel like a sound anymore, just an emotion, flashing straight from his lips to your chest.

A gunshot. 

Its unmistakable crack echoes through the trees. Bucky is moving before Steve can even feel surprise. It happens too fast. A rough hand at his back and Bucky’s shoving him to the gravel. Knee on his back to pin him down. Steve can hear the slide of a semi-automatic pistol cock, ready to fire.

Steve draws a breath— _okay, it’s okay, it’s okay._ But Bucky is jerking him up, metal fist in his shirt, pulling him off the path, down into a nearby ditch. He throws Steve to the dirt and braces himself over his body. One knee in the mud, thigh pressed to Steve’s side, one boot in the dirt.

Steve manages to turn his head and see Bucky framed against the sun. Scanning the trees, eyes sharp, mouth set. Crouched, arms locked, finger on the trigger.

“Buck,” Steve manages, voice wavering between urgent and calming, “It’s okay. It’s a shooting range. They’re just—they’re not—”

Bucky blinks and Steve knows this moment matters. Knew it would come and he thanks fate that they’re alone. Bucky needs to know it’s okay. _I’ll take all of you_. Nothing to be ashamed of. _I’ll take it all._

Bucky looks down at Steve, hands fall from their grip to the ground. His body slumps and he rolls off to the side. Landing so his back rests against a tree, pistol loose in the hand that was built to wield it. Eyes flickering, face pale. He looks like he’s searching himself from the inside and Steve freezes. Wants to draw him in but doesn’t know what he needs. _Space? Time? Not words. Not now._

Steve stands and extends a hand to help him up. Bucky takes it, eyes on the ground, and they walk back in silence.

There’s another gunshot, a few minutes later, when their breathing has slowed, and Bucky jolts. _Pull him close. Whisper in his ear. Grip his shoulder and anchor him again._ But Steve doesn’t. They get back on the bike. Roar of rushing wind on the road.

_I don’t care, Buck. If you carry a gun. I don’t care._

 

* * *

 

“What are these?”

“Oh—” Here you are, flushing and starting again, “New speakers. For the house.”

Bucky looks down at the box thoughtfully.

“You can hook them up to the record player if you want. Or the stereo. All the wires are in the box. I thought you might—like to—” _install them? Keep yourself busy? Stay here, in the house, where there are no gunshots?_

Bucky nods at his clumsy invitation.

“You’ve always been better at technical stuff.”

Bucky’s eyes snap to focus on his face and Steve gives him a smile that probably says too little. _I’ll get you whatever you want. Just—please—_

Steve bends to grab his bag, full of clothes made whole by Bucky’s stitching, “I’ll be home soon.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked the long chapter!
> 
> Don't eat duck eggs, kids. They're awful. Has anyone else tried to operate those hand-wavy light controls? Also awful/hilarious.
> 
> The next two chapters are a bit of a doozy, so please! bear with me! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlsZN8-5zGI)


	10. To Let Live

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are men who live their entire lives without killing another. You know, under your ribs where thoughts sit like shards and grate on you, that you cannot live like them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack Suggestion!
> 
> Xtatic Truth by Crystal Fighters  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfVuVLis8wU

Blood gushes so bright, the most vivid color nature could think of, a scarlet warning. And dries dark and thick, wilts to brown like leaves expiring. But when you wash it away, it springs to life again, running red and vibrant down the drain. A last gasp for a life that is already spent.

Bucky stands at their sink, stripped to the waist, scrubbing his hands with single-minded focus. _You’re calling this too close._ He glances at the time on his phone. Two minutes, maximum. Bucky scrapes the crusted blood from under his fingernails with a grey washcloth.

He splashes water on his face, a shock of cold. Turns without opening his eyes and dries it with a single swipe of the towel.

He can hear the rumble of a car engine through the open bathroom door. Quick steps to the closet, tug a shirt over damp hair. Trip down the stairs so he’s in the hall, leaning easy against the wall when—

“Hey,” Steve always comes through the door first, eyes shining with relief.

“Hey,” and he pulls the duffel from Steve’s arms.

 

* * *

 

_He has things to do._

Bucky tightens the screw of the bathroom drawer’s knob with the pad of his thumb.

_He’s been away from home for four days._

Bucky leans out of the bathroom doorway, hand gripping the frame. From this angle, he can see past Steve’s open door.

_His phone always seems to be ringing._

Bucky watches him shift a paper from the bottom of a loose stack. His eyes scan the page, body  still and focused, and he types something into his laptop.

_Busy._

He steps into the hall, self-consciously visible in the doorway, though Steve has his back to him.

_Let him be._

Bucky leans against his door frame, knuckles poised over the wood.

_You are selfish._

He knocks softly on the wood paneling. Steve turns immediately, smile already curling up.

“Hey,” _last chance_ —“What are we doing today?”

Steve’s face melts soft and grateful, “Let’s go to the zoo.” _Like he was expecting you. Just waiting for you to ask._

 

* * *

 

Steve takes the scenic route. Just another chance to trade touches. Summertime, so— _let’s take the bike._ Coax fingers to rest easy around his waist, don’t jump, don’t feel, don’t shake. Like it means nothing. But Bucky rocks against his back when they come to a stop and Steve leans into it. Bucky shifts his leg so his knee rustles, a touch of friction, against Steve’s hip. He leans forward to tell him something, the front of his shoulder touching the back of Steve’s though their shirts. Steve turns into the sound, bringing Bucky’s face so close to his ear. Just trading touches.

Do you want him to want? _It’s dangerous like this_. He can only see glimpses of you, like a statue through the trees. And he will turn away when you meet face to face.

Steve tries to buy tickets but the cashier won’t let him. Awkward recognition and he ducks away, flushed thank you. _Of course they know, Steve. Of course they know who you are._

Bucky unfolds the paper map and plots a route in black pen. Steve watches over his shoulder, wearing that grin, happy to follow. _But when it matters, Steve, I am following you._

They weave through the crowds, caps and sunglasses so they’re left alone. There are animals that neither of them has ever heard of. They absorb the stiff descriptions printed on placards— _Lemurs are a clade of strepsirrhine primates endemic to the island of Madagascar_ —the zoo is perfect theatre for curiosity.

They stop in front of the giraffes’ enclosure to watch the keeper shovel hay into lofted cages. Long black tongues slip out, long, sculpted jaws twist the strands to a pulp. Bucky rests with his metal hand against the railing. Leaning into a slouch he has carefully relearned. Steve is speaking, low voice because they’re always close. A child screeches in delight and Steve leans in to be heard. He lets his left hand rest next to Bucky’s on the rail and his body mirrors Bucky’s posture. Just a bit closer and they’d fit perfectly together, Bucky’s back pressed to his chest. Steve would probably let his fingers touch Bucky’s hand, use his other arm to pull him close, no air left between them, _tilt his head into yours, soft heat of his breath through your hair—_

Bucky pivots away, swift withdrawal. He tips his head back to say— _on to the next one_. Steve swallows and follows him. Too close for words now.

They stop again to watch a tiger pull red meat from the bone. It eats lazily, sharp teeth searching for purchase in the gore. No one will take this meal away. Nor did it have to be earned. Life comes easy for some. Road rage and office politics like the plastic ball in the tiger’s cage. Stand-ins for fights that matter: an enemy that can wound you in battle or prey that can escape and leave you starving.

You were born in a cage and forced into the wild. You became what you were meant to be; an animal. Bucky takes lives like a reflex. It comes to you like tying your shoes. Like speaking in tongues you don’t remember learning. Like snapping your fingers. Like blinking. Like breathing.

Blink. Steady the sights. Breathe in. Pull the trigger.

There are men who live their entire lives without killing another. You know, under your ribs where thoughts sit like shards and grate on you, that you cannot live like them.

Because those men could die, huddled and shaking, under the barrel of a gun. And know without a doubt, that there was nothing they could have done. But you know that you can live. Flash your claws and sink your teeth. And you can kill for others to live.

You came home to the cage. You chose this life. But you can’t take that knowledge back; that death is not inevitable. So you draw your gun and steady the sights. You’re still killing.

Bucky forces air into his lungs. Look at the trees, blink up at the sky. Feel the chipping paint under your fingertips. Listen to the easy, instinctive sounds people make around you. You’re alive.

Bucky pushes away from the glass and trusts Steve to follow.

 

* * *

 

The cool dark of the aquarium calms the mind. Bucky watches the otters, following their fluid dance. Amazed at their grace. Children yelp and run but Bucky doesn’t jump. His mind is filling in its catalog of sounds, which signal danger and which don’t. Which can be enjoyed.

Steve stands next to him, endless patience for the silence. In this moment, with your heart fluttering, unsure of who it beats for, the world is slipping and you are caught in its twisting. Your fingers itch to touch him. Reach out and still the spinning. But what if the slip is stronger? And if you drag him down— _The way he looks at you. The light in his eyes. I will sink us both._

But you can’t stop yourself. Just an animal with instincts. You tap the inside of his elbow to ask him to follow you.

There’s a shallow pool at waist height. Lit with a track of lights in an otherwise dark room. People reach into the water, reverential eyes, and run delicate fingers over stingrays and starfish. Bucky approaches, watching others for cues, and dips his right hand in the water. Steve joins him, hand glancing over the same fish. 

Bucky leans down to inspect its fragile, silky skin and Steve pulls his sunglasses from where they’re perched on his head, threatening to fall forward. He tucks Bucky’s glasses into the neck of his shirt, so they hang next to his own. It’s the little things that calm you. How easy it is.

 

* * *

 

They buy four hot dogs— _What’s this excuse for a bun?_ The food court tables are crowded, people pushing and moving with urgency, so they walk back up the path. Find a hilly field between two enclosures, a transitional place.

They stretch out on the grass, eating lazily. A few words but mostly silence. When they’re done, red and white checked food boxes stacked off to the side, they stay. Bucky lays back, hair sprawling over the grass, and watches the clouds. Steve lays close by, propped on one elbow so he can look at Bucky when he speaks.

Clouds move so slowly he can barely register the movement. They drift in front of the sun, bright warmth to quickly cooling shade. It is so peaceful and Bucky is full of something he didn’t have to pursue. It just came. Beautiful blue.

You close your eyes. Soft sounds of the world around you.

 

* * *

 

Bucky is so still. When he closes his eyes, Steve relaxes a bit and just watches his face. He’s careful to not to lean over him, so he can quickly look away when Bucky opens them again.

Bucky’s wearing a lighter coat today. A thin synthetic material because Steve worries about him getting hot under all the canvas. Bucky gave him a look but took the coat. He takes everything Steve gives him. His left hand is resting lightly on his stomach, flesh and bone fingers resting in the grass. He’s been using his hands nearly interchangeably. His jacket is open and Steve can see the slow rise and fall of his chest through his thin shirt.

Following his breath makes the hair on the back of Steve’s neck rise, alert. It’s intimate, watching him like this. Eyes drinking in details.

A bug lands in Bucky’s hair and Steve reaches for it, careful not to make a sound. He brushes three fingers through Bucky’s hair. The bug flutters away and Steve’s excuse is ready on his lips— _I was just_ —but Bucky doesn’t move.

Steve is still, watching him, waiting.

_He’s asleep._

Here. In the middle of everything. Out in public, new place, people everywhere. He’s asleep. Feeling safe and relaxed next to Steve. He looks down at Bucky and curls his fingers back into his hair.

Steve strokes the softness. He likes Bucky’s long hair. He’s picking up a lot from this new world and it seems to fit. His fingers search deeper and he runs a tentative finger along Bucky’s scalp.

_You’re in deep now Rogers. What’s your excuse?_ Bucky doesn’t stir so he lets all his fingers rest on his skin. _What’s your excuse for any of the touches?_ Gentle pressure against his head as Steve stretches his hand and then Bucky does move. Tips his head into the touch. The faintest hum of contentment leaves his lips and sends Steve’s stomach spiraling. He bites down to stop the sounds rising in his own throat.

He rubs small, gentle circles, drawing his hair away from his head, hand closing around thick tufts. Bucky makes another soft sound and lets his head roll toward Steve. The heat in his chest swells and fills him. _Oh, Buck. What are we doing?_

Is he awake now? It doesn’t matter. They won’t talk about this, Steve already knows. How do you explain? What do you say? There are no words, just wanting. 

 

* * *

 

“Should we get you a bank account?”

“I already got a bank account.”

“Oh.”

Bucky laughs, wants it to be light, but his chest is drawing in on itself, so it comes out uneasy.

“Not in my name.”

“Oh,” Steve’s hesitating, biting back words again. You can tell by the way the silence feels. Tense. _It’s just for now, Steve._ He changes the subject the way he always does, searching for a path around instead of diving in, “You know about ATMs?”

Bucky chuckles again, easier, “Yeah, I know how to use them,” he pauses and wants to stop but the words are already rising— _can’t bite them back like you can_ , “I can break them open too.”

Steve looks over at him, eyes surprised.

Bucky just shrugs, _shouldn’t have said that_ , “Sometimes I needed cash.”

Steve’s making some joke and changing the subject again. Bucky keeps up, quips on his lips, but his heart is sinking, stuck in the tense silence. _I have broken open more than ATMs. Darkness living in your shadow. I have been killing and you do not know._

 

* * *

 

It’s how you use your body weight. The shift between human—upright, weight settled in your hip, leaning against walls, head following your eyes’ interests—and weapon—weight centered, knees ready, move on instinct, eyes follow patterns, body follows training. You gather your strength to a focused point. Ready to throw yourself behind the thrust of a blade. Claw a man’s face, rip off your fingernails to bring him down. Or drop it all to the floor, stand still as stone, and squeeze a bullet from the chamber.

Bucky does push-ups in his room. It will take an hour before his arms begin to burn, but he chases it. Exhausts himself to learn his limits. Own the body you have so you get to decide. When to live and when to kill.

 

* * *

 

Steve’s door is open. It is always open. Even now, when he is getting dressed. They didn’t have doors in Brooklyn, just one room to share, and Steve seems to want that back. The inescapability of the other.

You see Steve hesitate but you lost that skill years ago. Fight your instincts lest they own you. Or follow them and swim in the fleeting peace of just doing whatever you want to.

So Bucky just walks in. He’s got a thin cotton shirt tucked into unbuttoned pants. Pulling on a crisp, pale blue dress shirt. He aligns the top button with its hole and catches sight of Bucky.

A hint of surprise in his voice but he makes some easy comment about not wanting to go to this thing. Some downtown event with politicians whose mouths never stop smiling. He had invited Bucky but they both knew he’d say no. Bucky says something in return about keeping them honest.

Steve talks about the event as he buttons his shirt. Words seem to spring from his mind without filter.

He lifts one arm to close the cuff but fumbles the small button between his fingers. Bucky reaches out and takes his wrist. He pulls it down and closer, following its movement instead of meeting Steve’s eyes. He slips the button into place, metal and skin brushing against Steve’s open palm, the sensitive crease of his wrist.

_We used to do this._  

Bucky’s eyes flick up as he reaches for Steve’s other hand. This is new. Looking into someone’s eyes and knowing—not knowing how you know—that their body feels just like yours does in this moment. That Steve’s stomach is sending up a wisp of heat, his heart rising in his chest. That his skin is dancing with the heat of their hands, effortless touch. That his mind is racing, trying to figure out what to do, what to say. 

_But we didn’t used to feel this. Not that I remember._

Their words don’t falter, getting better at ignoring the tumult. Steve talks and Bucky replies, chuckles, hums, quips. He takes far too long with each button. 

Words spring to mind so he voices them— _anything for you punk_. Phrases that feel familiar but aren’t attached to anything on the inside. He just knows they make Steve’s face light up and that’s wonderful and dangerous at once. Steve wants the man he knew in Brooklyn. Wants his Bucky back again. _I’m not sure if I am that man_. So much is missing that Steve can’t fill in. _I don’t remember what it felt like. I don’t know if I can be him again. And I don’t want to disappoint you._

Stop trading touches. _What are you doing?_

 

* * *

 

They listen to records and drink tea. Bucky has found that he doesn’t really remember music. Doesn’t have tastes, not the way Steve prefers the music they grew up with. So he clears a space for music in his mind and starts over. Clean slate, try everything. It’s the same with food and clothing and humor. But the last one’s easy. Just reflect Steve back at him. Only ever trying to make one person laugh.

Soft, acoustic sounds from the speakers. Bucky’s socked foot rests on the edge of the coffee table. Steve is draped over a chair, one leg on the arm rest. It strikes Bucky as familiar and he thinks Steve must have learned this posture with a smaller body.

Steve’s eyes drift and you think about telling him. That you’ve been adding to your tally. Washing blood down the drain.

But you don’t. He’ll turn to you with comfort and it’s too soft to take.

 

* * *

 

Steve is packing for a mission. Bucky sits in the kitchen and his fingers twitch. Steve walks in and Bucky looks up, too quick, butterflies in his stomach.

The second he leaves, lingering look in the hallway by the door, you are sprinting up the stairs. Knife from the dresser, gun from the bathroom. You’ll get the rest as you go. A pit in your stomach and you know you will kill again.

Deep breaths, hands pack clips into your bag. Steady your fingers, tie on your boots. You hesitate now, hands tugging on your jacket, like hesitation can make you human. You know true men think twice before death. There is a pause, skin of their finger resting on the trigger. That look in their eyes, knowing they’re doing something that can never be undone.

They pause to ask themselves if they are sure. If they can live with it. Bucky does not have that. Too many deaths. He does not hesitate. What’s another? Take it like a reflex. Only in the gasping nights when he returns to this bed does he weigh the meaning. Count the men he’s killed. Fresh blood. _And why? Why do you do this?_ To live.

To let live.

For you, there is only one out, before it begins. And here, cold metal in your hands, alone under this roof, heart thudding in your chest, it has already begun.


	11. Close Your Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You do not flinch, because blind men do not see death, even when its jaws yawn open to consume them, its rank breath damp on their skin. You watch his eyes. Death rips through the air with you in its sights and in your last fraction of a second you watch his eyes. They are dark with the blackest anger. His brows are drawn to leave no question—I mean this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, the soundtrack purist in me says there is only one possible soundtrack for this chapter. It's some mash-up of the Winter Soldier theme and Taking a Stand from the CATWS soundtrack. (Somebody please make this! I will listen to it continuously.) Here are both, for your listening pleasure!
> 
> The Winter Soldier by Henry Jackman  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVJGh51wR7k
> 
> Taking A Stand by Henry Jackman  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5K3RY1OzfY  
>    
> German dialog provided by the wonderful yvieinsane! Thank you yvie!

Steve’s sitting the back of a black car with tinted windows. Rolling through Zurich in a silent cage. He’s wearing a brand new suit with microphones stitched into the lining.

He’s undercover, in a way. Still Captain America, of course, even Swiss scientists know his face, but here he’s presented as a diplomat, a recruiting tool. 

Hydra’s influence ran deep. They had powerful allies and ties to brilliant minds whose names never appeared in print or pixels. So when Nick and Natasha spilled their secrets, these silent contributors skittered into the shadows, anonymous. Nick was mapping out Hydra’s true network, the deep, thin, edges of its reach, and needed help. But who can just walk up and ask about ties to Hydra? Nick’s dead after all and Natasha’s loyalties will always be suspect. 

No one will ever suspect Steve of espionage. That would be ridiculous. Send one of the most recognizable men on the planet to casually probe for information? 

 _“Exactly. They’ll never know what happened,”_ Fury’s voice echoed in his mind.

Steve had a cover— _recruiting scientists for a military program, surprise, surprise_ — a list of red flags— _any association with Dr. John Wade, present in Austria during 1998, knowledge of the Apogeion Initiative_ —and a list of names to drop as long as his arm. They were gambling that these men and women had a foggier view of the inside of Hydra than they did. One name too many and their targets might connect the dots.

_“So why me?”_

_“Because no one will turn down Captain America.”_

And he was right. Steve had four meetings today and five tomorrow. Not a single declined invitation. The first on his list was Dr. Gerd Kölbel. Meeting at a little cafe in the city.

The car pulls up and Kölbel is already there. Steve steps out with a smile and offers an offhand apology as his bodyguard pats down the slender man with greying hair. The bodyguard retreats to the car and the car retreats to the end of the block.

Just two men sitting in twisted metal chairs painted white. Nice suits and polished voices. The business of politics.

The conversation is easy enough. Kölbel seems genuinely surprised and a bit starstruck. He confirms everything Steve mentions, trying to appear up to whatever challenge was great enough that they sent Captain America to find someone to solve it.

Then Steve asks about the Apogeion Initiative— _why not?_ And Kölbel gives him a knowing smile. “Of course, Mr. Rogers. I was the founder.”

 _Founder? Shouldn’t Fury have known that?_  

Something’s wrong. 

Suddenly wary, Steve shifts in his chair, opens his mouth to thank him and end the meeting.

He looks up, voice signaling closure, “Well, Dr. Kölbel—” but the scientist’s eyes are blank with fear, widening over Steve’s shoulder.

His muscles tense, eyes sharpen. _Why did you come unarmed?_ Steve spins, ready for an attack, to follow the doctor’s gaze.

Time stops. 

 

It is the Winter Soldier.

 

Walking straight toward them. Black and leather. Metal arm exposed, glinting in the sun. Pistol in his hand. Black cloth over his face like that mask you tore away. Long steps, he’s not in a hurry. He is so beautiful.

This is when you close your eyes. You give up reality for the world in your mind. You’re watching the Winter Soldier but you just see Bucky. He’s 20 feet away and you can hear the man behind you scrambling. The Winter Solider is raising his gun, and all you can think is—

_It’s okay._

_Bucky, you don’t have to._

_We can start over._

You can see the black of the barrel, but—

_Let’s go back home. Don’t do this. We’ll start over._

The slide is already cocked, he’s drawing his left shoulder back to brace against the kick—

_Please, Buck. Let’s start over._

These words never reach your mouth. The Winter Soldier stops moving and as soon as his body stills— _no hesitation_ —he pulls the trigger. The gun flashes and the sky cracks.

The bullet flies toward you. Your window for ducking out of its path opens and closes in the blink of an eye. 

You do not flinch, because blind men do not see death, even when its jaws yawn open to consume them, its rank breath damp on their skin. You watch his eyes. Death rips through the air with you in its sights and in your last fraction of a second you watch his eyes. They are dark with the blackest anger. His brows are drawn to leave no question— _I mean this._  

The heat of the bullet reaches Steve’s face. He wouldn’t know it by name if he hadn’t been inches from death so many times before, just dress rehearsals for this moment. He waits— _not long now_ —for it to rip him apart. 

You were born a martyr.

But the pain never comes. A wet thunk of metal through flesh and it is not yours. A hiss of blood spraying in its wake. You blink.

Gunfire erupts around you. The shock of it, the relentless battery of automatic weapons, shakes you into yourself again. _I have to get him out of here._

But Bucky is already gone. Steve spins to confirm what he already knows, Kölbel dead behind him, blood on the concrete. He reels, off-balance and lifts their table, glass shattering at his feet, as a makeshift shield. Steve crouches and finally spots a flash of black over his head. Bucky is sprinting up the side of the building, metal fingers ripping handholds in aging brick.

Bullets spray around him, crushing the bricks to a cloud of dust. Steve hears a metal zing and recognizes, sick lurch in his stomach, the sound of a bullet glancing off Bucky’s arm.

That pulls Steve to his feet. He’s running with the table at his side, sprinting to the alley. Drop the table and tear into the shadows. Frantic eyes— _where did he go?_

Outrage lights his skin on fire. _How could this happen._ Where the fuck were Fury’s men? 

Steve hears the scuff of boots on the roof, the roll of body armor over hot tar, then nothing. Just hot lead eating the building away with a shower of bullets. The percussion of overpowered guns, too close.

Steve’s yelling into the microphone in his collar. He’s ripping off his suit jacket and rounding the corner, searching the roof edge for Bucky, hoping he’s already gone. Steve skids around to the other alley, circling the building, when a fist in his shirt rips him off his feet. He’s pulled through a barely open door. Instincts already kicking in, he twists and falls forward, taking his attacker down.

The man twists in Steve’s arms and pushes up on his elbows, boots scrambling to find the floor. Steve looks up without releasing him. It’s Bucky. He’s breathing hard, pulling the black cloth down from his nose.

They stare at each other, chests heaving together, a tangle of limbs on the dusty floor. Like they’re naked. Claws bared, so exposed.

This is who you really are. Two soldiers at war. Both of you play like you can just live. Buy groceries, listen to records, sleep in the grass. Live under a roof. But your weapons are always by your side and you flee to battle the moment it calls you. It’s not surprising, so close your mouth. It’s not surprising that you’d find each other here, skin hot from the near miss of bullets. That you’d be pushing and pulling each other again, one in two bodies; when did one ever go to war without the other?

Bucky’s eyes dart over Steve’s face. They mirror things he feels but can’t put into words. They’re alert, the way people watch each other on the battlefield, but settling. Waves of anger calming to ocean-deep relief.

Steve huffs a desperate sound. _You’re alive_. He tries to still his hammering heart. _Bucky, I—_ but they’re not out of this yet. Suddenly remembering the gunfire on the roof, the dead man on the sidewalk, he pulls away and spits their location into his mic.

Pushes back on his knees, dirt coating his dress pants, and offers Bucky his hand.

He blinks, looking strangely vulnerable sprawled on the floor, and takes it. In the silence Steve thinks of something to say, something he should have said before now. But he draws a breath and the door crashes in behind him. SHIELD agents spilling in, guns at the ready, rough hands pulling Steve out the opening. He lunges forward and grips Bucky’s arm.

The two of them are hustled out of the building, into a waiting van disguised to look like a delivery vehicle. 

The drive to Fury’s safe house is silent. The pair of agents in riot gear beside them keep their guns in their laps and their eyes on Bucky.

 

* * *

 

_“What the hell were you thinking Rogers?”_

_“He’s my friend.”_ Steve grimaces, replaying the conversation in his mind.

_“That you could just handle this alone?”_

_“He’s not a threat.”_

_“He just killed a man in broad daylight.”_

_“And what about the Hydra agents, Nick?” voice rising sharply, accusatory, “Did you have any idea how many guns were trained on us out there? Fucking sitting ducks.”_

_“We didn’t expect someone to assassinate our lead in the middle of the mission.”_

_“And if he hadn’t?”_ Rage grips him again at the memory, _“Kölbel was the founder of the Apogeion Initiative, Nick. Not some side-project scientist. They knew exactly what we were doing and I was stumbling blind out there, revealing everything. You think they would’ve just let me walk away?”_

The car pulls to a stop. They’re back at Steve’s swank hotel, the kind of place fit for a diplomat. They’d put Bucky up in a room at Steve’s insistence— _Detain him?! Like a criminal? Nick, I swear to god, if you put him in a cell, I will_ —and Steve’s hoping he’s still there. 

Steve’s gritting his teeth in the elevator, tense shoulders against the mirrored walls. What a mess. _How did he find me? Why would he do this?_

Long strides down the hall to room 407. Quick knock on the door and hold your breath. _Don’t run, Buck. Come on. Tell me you’re still here._

The door swings open and Bucky is there. Shirtless and silent. Steve’s eyes immediately fall to the scars that knit his arm to his body. He forgets his questions and explanations. Mind blank and he stares. _It’s so good to see you._

Bucky waits for words but gets none. He falls back a step and walks into his bathroom. The faucet hisses to life and Steve drops his eyes, gathers his thoughts. He steps inside the hotel room and shuts the door. Tread twice and he’s in the bathroom doorway. Bucky is standing at the sink, arms locked, weight sunk into his shoulders. He’s watching the water, hair hanging loose in front of his face.

Steve’s loses his balance again, bewitching sight. Confusion and concern folds itself away in his mind, feels less important now, and he follows the curve of Bucky’s neck. His eyes take in the muscle of his back, thicker than it was, the taper of his waist, the veins of his forearms rippling the skin.

He looks up to Bucky’s face and meets his eyes in the mirror. He’s waiting, so Steve begins, “Bucky, what are you doing here?” A plea.

Bucky says nothing.

“How did you—” he swallows the question. Maybe he should be the first to explain, “My mission was—”

“I know what your mission was,” Bucky interrupts, voice flat, “Meet in public, show up unarmed, and drop Hydra names like you’re trying to join the club.”

“We had men waiting around the block—”

“They’re dead Steve. They were dead before you got out of the car.”

“There were three SHIELD snipers on the roof.”

“Also dead. Don’t you think I checked?” his voice cracks a little around the words. Bucky turns to face him, leans back on the sink, “You’re always walking out there like you’re ready to die.” An accusation.

“I trust the men who fight with me.” _They do the best they can; that’s all I can ask._

“Maybe you shouldn’t. Where were your men in Budapest?”

Steve blinks.

“Always a little too late. Left you cornered without your shield.”

“You were in Budapest?”

Bucky’s face darkens with resignation. His eyes flicker with the inevitability of all this.

Steve answers his own question, “You’ve been there for all of them. How many now?” his voice is hushing to a whisper, “Eight? Nine?”

Silence hangs and he reels in the void. _What about all the phone calls? How did you get home before me?_ He aches to know Bucky has hidden so much, “Buck, why didn’t you say something?”

“You would have sent me home. And what good am I there? How many times would I have lost—” voice pitching, he swallows and tries again, “How many times would you have thrown your life away.” Not a question.

“Buck, I—” you spin into the gap he opens. Not sure how to explain— _it doesn’t feel like that to me_ , “you know I don’t have a choice.”

Bucky’s face hardens, “You do,” then the words come quickly, fluid with the cadence of something he has thought about many times, “You decide why you fight. These wars never end and _I don’t have a choice_ is a shit reason, Steve. You know why I’m here?” he shifts onto his feet and steps closer, arms crossed over his chest, eyes steady and dark, this he knows for sure, “I’m here because of you.”

Steve’s stomach drops and he’s frozen. Bucky just says it; fragile, open words. He always had been better at putting words to whatever hovered between them. In the years without him you just left things unsaid. You pushed forward and found the fight, spoke with your fists. But he is here again, your other half, filling in the gaps. Doing what you do not, reminding you what you lack.

“Do you know how many men I have killed before they could kill you?” a pained look, it hurts him to say it, “I’m here because if I don’t watch your back, you _will not_ come home again,” anger flashes in his tone but his eyes are wounded, worried.

Bucky is so close, bare chest, clouded eyes, and Steve just wants to pull him in. Slide your arms around his waist and pull him in. Pull him in and tell him with touch the things that sit and sputter on your tongue. But he deserves to hear it, so you shake your head and try, “Buck, if I lost you—” stumbling immediately, “I can’t do that again, I—” _you mean too much, losing you changed me, and getting you back, it’s a second chance—_

“That’s not your choice to make,” Bucky’s voice is quiet now too, “This is who I am,” he gestures to his left arm and Steve’s heart twists, “This is all I have,” his arm sweeps through the air between them— _meaning what? The two of us? What is this?_

Be brave. Be brave and tell him what it is. Ask what the two of you are. Pull him in. _Pull him in_. But instead you croak, “Why did you kill Kölbel?”

Bucky blinks. He exhales, a puff of air on Steve’s neck, “There was no other way. Too many guns trained on you. They needed a new target.”

“So you made yourself the target,” Steve’s throat like sandpaper, “Killed their lead man at point blank range and saved my cover.”

Bucky nods once. He must sense the plea building behind Steve’s lips—y _ou don’t have to Buck. You don’t have to finish my fights anymore_ —because his words land like a warning, “You don’t get to do this alone. I can’t let—” his voice cracks and he swallows the emotion to steel, “Don’t you fucking try to send me home, Rogers. Because I will find you.” Eyes spitting with anger, mouth a determined line.

Steve just stares at him, so close, so open, words finally matching the emotion in his eyes. Fears and convictions hang fresh in the air between them. He shows you so much. 

Trust can bloom, delicate flower in a peaceful place, but here, nothing but war and loyalties, it cuts into you. Grips your lungs in a vise, sinks in your gut. Trust is not insurance. It will be tested, throw your weight into its net, and you will both pay the price.

Bucky is back at the sink. The whole world in a single hotel room. Expectant silence fades to white noise, until neither is waiting for the other to speak.  Bucky’s running water over a shallow cut by his wrist. Metal fingers massage, loosening the black gravel flecks from the flesh.

Your fingers itch and your resolve is crumbling. Feeling disoriented and unsure, you just want to feel him against you. Just to touch, that’s all. Thoughts spin and your chest is hollow— _just let me hold you_. Felt too much for one day— _so you’re leaning on him? He walks through hell for you, pulls Hydra bullets away while you spin on your heel. And you’re turning to him for comfort? He’s been through enough._

Steve looks down, turns silently, and steps back to the door. Pull it open, soft click as it closes. He pads down the hotel hallway, dripping confusion and guilt and the glow of having him close in a trail on the carpet.

“Hey, Steve,” Bucky’s voice cuts down the hall.

Steve stops and turns, Bucky is still shirtless— _Come back here. Why don’t you stay here tonight? Just like we used to. I could use the company. Just one bed, but what does it matter? I don’t like to sleep alone._ Steve’s stomach is jumping at the imagined conversation before Bucky has said a word. You want it more than you’ll admit.

“You’ve got to learn German. You’re a fucking liability out there.”

Warmth in his chest just to hear his voice, “Who was speaking German?

“The guy at the cafe who took your order was obviously Hydra. His Swiss German sucked.”

Distantly, Steve remembers the doctor ordering in his native tongue and the waiter responding in kind. He smiles at Bucky and says, “Why don’t you teach me?” It sounded like a jab in his mind but it came out soft, an invitation.

Bucky smirks, “Wenn du mich bittest zeig ich dir mehr als das.”

Then he’s gone, shadow in the doorway, soft click as the door fills the gap.

Steve’s smiling at the carpet on the way back to his room. It feels good to have him here— _is that wrong?_ It feels good to know Bucky has his back. 

And he will never learn German, or Swiss German, or any of the languages Bucky speaks, because he wants Bucky to have something Steve doesn’t have. A skill he can use however he likes. And below that, where reasons lay hidden by less-frightening reasons, Steve likes that he uses it to protect him.

It feels right, like the stars have snapped back into orbit. Tomorrow, they will fly home together.


	12. There It Is

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It was my choice. It was worth it to me.” 
> 
> “Well it’s not worth it to me. That’s my choice.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack Suggestion!
> 
> Purexed by P.O.S.  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JHbUuWzVNE

The negotiation starts on the plane ride home. In a diplomatic jet to preserve Steve’s cover. Buckled in to leather seats side-by-side, knees grazing when they shift.

Low voices so the airplane hum drowns out the sound.

“If you’re going to be out there, I want you on the team. I want to know where you are.”

“That’s not how I work.”

“Come on, Bucky. You’ll know the plan; you’ll know where I am too.”

“I already know where you are,” Bucky looks straight ahead, watching the crew chatting by the cockpit, “Wherever the bullets are flying.”

“You can do more if you’re a part of the mission,” Steve is twisted in his seat, shoulder buried in the cushion, side of his head against the headrest, watching Bucky’s face. Nine hours, transatlantic flight, and Bucky knows Steve will watch him the whole time.

“I don’t want to do more,” his head turns, faces so close like this. Steve’s eyes jump and flit like they’re trying to take it all in, “I already have a mission.”

Steve stills and Bucky knows he doesn’t have to say it— _you are my mission_.

Bucky turns to the window, watching the clouds under the wing. Everything feels a little too raw, like the world is sunburned. Thoughts and actions he’s hidden for almost two months, shadow flitting around the world to stalk his three-dimensional self, now they just spill from his mouth. He chose to walk out, draw his gun, kill a man to save another. And on that dusty floor, tangled with Steve, he pulled off his own mask. Decided not to hide anymore.

A scrap of him, carefully tucked away where wordless thoughts live, is pleased that Steve now knows he’s always there. Always has been, always will be. _This is all I have_ —and he meant it. _Like a shadow, I don’t exist without you._

“I know, Buck,” Steve’s voice cuts into his thoughts, “but there are— bigger things worth fighting for too.”

“Like what? This feels like war to me.”

Steve is silent, question on his brow.

“A fight is something you pick yourself. A war is when you don’t know why you’re fighting. When men kill because they’re told to.”

“Sometimes you need an army to change things for the better. Someone has to lead,” that familiar righteous indignation in his voice. Still an idealist.

“And sometimes you lead a hundred men to their deaths and nothing changes. You wake up and we’re still at war. You fight for good, but is it worth it?” Bucky searches his face, “War just means you can kill a man and you don’t have to bury the body. Because no one will come looking for you. Violence is expected. There’s nothing ‘good’ or ‘right’ about war.”

Bucky watches dismay color his eyes and thinks, a thought from someone else’s mind— _you never should have gone to war_ , “You’re just a soldier. You kill who the men on top tell you to kill. You come when they call you,” Bucky feels his chest shake with an anger that’s deeper than he remembers. _It’s not true—_ but the words tumble out, bitterness in his mouth, “The only fights worth finishing were the ones you picked yourself in back alleys. At least then you knew what you were fighting for.” 

A long silence. Easier to spit anger than swallow it and apologize. You are hurt, but why? _He doesn’t owe you anything._ Bucky stares at the seat back and throttles his pride. When did you sink so low? Snapping words just to hurt him. 

“I have— the opportunity to make a difference. But I can’t be everywhere, see everything. I trust the men who can with my life,” Steve’s voice is shrunk back in his throat, too quiet, but firm.

“And how many times have you died? Twice now? How many times have you thrown yourself on a grenade and gotten lucky when it didn’t go off?” _There’s no excuse for how reckless you are._

“It was my choice. It was worth it to me.”

“Well it’s not worth it to me. That’s my choice.” _I can’t lose you._

Just wrestling for the right to live and die on their own terms. Two lives, two minds too closely intertwined. Two men who feel too much.

 

* * *

 

Things are different at home. A bit more at ease, oddly. Fewer secrets in the air.

Bucky plays music too loud in the car. Steve wouldn’t let him drive without a license— _it’s too dangerous Buck, what if you get pulled over_ —so he got a fake ID. They don’t go anywhere, just loop through neighborhoods and parkways. Summer air whipping through the car, all the windows down.

Sometimes he plays music he thinks Steve will like, and sometimes he tries something new. Stealing glances, smiling at the windshield as Steve tries not to wince at unfamiliar sounds.

Bucky puts in a new CD without looking. A familiar opening chord, he’s knows [the song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JHbUuWzVNE) immediately. The vocals come in, an easy spoken rap, and they listen for a few verses.

_I'm trying not to slip, been trying not to lose footing_

_Loose land keeps that pressure on my kicks_

_But when I fall I tend to land like a ton of bricks_

_Stand like a man made of concrete and sediment_

He looks over at Steve, whose brows are knit. He turns down the volume and asks, “Can you follow the lyrics?” Steve shakes his head.

Bucky’s grinning, “Really? Not at all?” Steve meets his eyes and smiles back at him.

The hook cuts in, drums rushing, familiar urgency. He opens his mouth and speaks the words, never acknowledged before now that he knows them all.

“Fuck it, back to the wall

Crush it, laugh at 'em all

Hush, let 'em try to find the beauty in your face

Yeah, something more than a song

Hating? Aww come on

Dust, let 'em try to find the beauty in the bass line"

He watches Steve watching him, not glancing at the road often enough. Steve watching his lips, the two of them drowning in sound. When the song ends, press the back button and they listen again. He plays it again and again until they’re back home. Back from their journey to nowhere.

 

* * *

 

It bubbles up again that afternoon. Steve is out on an errand and Bucky is in his room. Door closed. He’s got a ORSIS T-5000 sniper rifle stripped on a towel on his bed. Swiping a thin coat of oil through the bore, automatic routine, when the door swings open.

“Hey, Buck—”

Bucky doesn’t jump. He’s not hiding anymore and it’s almost too easy. _Here’s another secret for you, Steve._

“Oh, sorry,” Steve recovers, but doesn’t leave. He hangs in the doorway and Bucky turns his attention back to the gun, “Should we—get you a license or something? For that?”

“You and licenses. Who’s going to catch me?”

“Yeah…” hesitation hanging in the vowels, “I mean. People don’t normally— have rifles with them. Around here. You know, at the airport. Or the zoo.”

Bucky’s watching his conflicted expression. Searching for a way to say what he means— _normal people don’t bring the war home with them. Where did you even get that thing? How many others are there?_

_He’ll find out eventually._ Bucky doesn’t give him an inch, “I wouldn’t bring a sniper rifle to the zoo.”

“Right,” Steve nods to himself, “Okay, well, I’ll be downstairs.” 

Bucky knows he hates to leave things like this. He waits for Steve’s voice again.

“Lunch in 30 minutes?” An olive branch.

Bucky nods at the closing door.

 

* * *

 

But the questions become unavoidable— _spill one secret now you’re unraveling the whole cloth_ —when they run into each other in an underground hallway.

Bucky’s walking and talking, swagger and new accent to blend in, clothes he picked up in the locker room, doctored badge from an unlocked car. They round the corner and there he is.

Captain America in tactical blue. Hair shining gold under the fluorescent lights. The guy next to Bucky doesn’t falter, telling some story about a weekend basketball game, but Bucky’s preparing for the crash. _Come on Steve._ His eyes flick to favorite spots, the cut of his jaw, the graceful curve of his knees, the concentration on his brow as he waits by a closed door. _Help me out here._

“Hey, Captain!” The guy next to Bucky thankfully grabs Steve’s attention before they’re right on top of each other. Eyes lock and Steve jumps. He’s scanning Bucky’s body for some explanation. Handcuffs or a concealed weapon. Bucky sees him reeling— _What the hell is he doing here, four floors underground in a CIA building? Is that a badge? Who is he with?_ Bucky knows him too well, sees his eyes scan the hall behind him for the nearest exit. Preparing to break them both out of here.

He feels his lips curl a bit, Steve can be so dramatic, and the smile slips into his words, “Hey, are you Captain America?”

Steve stares, mouth open.

“Captain Rogers, this is Chuck. He’s a new addition to the shooting range instructor team.”

Bucky, an effortless actor, extends his hand with a wide-eyed look, “It’s an honor to meet you, sir.”

Steve sputters, takes it, forgets to shake, and replies, “Thank you—welcome” he nods, swallows, nods, “—to the—team.”

Maybe Steve will understand, _this is where the guns come from_. And maybe he will make Bucky explain. Maybe he’ll make him promise not to go back. 

They continue down the hall, Steve’s eyes hot on his back. Bucky thinks, amused, that whatever happens, it was worth it for the look on his face.

“Shit, man,” the guy next to him murmurs, ducking a smile behind his hand as they turn another corner, “You should ask him out,” he’s giggling, “Did you see how he looked at you?”

Bucky wasn’t expecting this. Doesn’t know what to say, his neck tenses. He mirrors the man’s muffled laugh and tries, “Yeah, you think so? Maybe he likes bad boys.”

His companion cracks up and Bucky exhales, learned smile. The guy chokes out, “Captain America got a dark side. Jesus, I’d pay to see that.”

 

* * *

 

Sure enough, Steve wants to talk about it. He’s in the hall when Bucky gets home, wearing that weary look.

A rapid volley about danger— _don’t try to tell me what’s risky, Steve. I’m just feeling the place out_. Pleas and questions that Bucky can’t answer. _It’s not like that. No one’s going to get hurt._

An hour in, in the kitchen, sitting close and tense.

“Buck,” Steve’s exhausted, elbows on his knees. He runs his hands through his hair and blinks at the floor, “You don’t have to live in the shadows.” He looks up. Direct, “Let’s be open about who you are. Let’s—make space for you. So you don’t have to hide.”

And the honesty, the open ask, makes Bucky drop his guard as well. “I don’t know who I am.”

Steve looks back at the floor. Maybe there is nothing left for him to say. So Bucky spills out another secret, “You have a team now. A team of people like you,” what he should have said on the plane, when he was too hurt to admit, “They seem strong and smart. Motivated to do the right thing,” Bucky pauses, “I’m not like that.”

Silence. All their conversations since Geneva have ended like this. They begin easy, skim the surface. Some comment or, more and more frequently, a disagreement. Then they spiral around each other, closer and closer, until they’re pulling open their own rib cages to expose the bloody core. Too close. Much too close. Trying to find a way to heal each other.

His heart bleeds a truth out his lips that he wasn’t ready to hear, “We’ve both become our true selves. You a hero, and me a fallen man.” Hollow eyes, he can see right through you.

“You’re ashamed of who you are. You have nothing to be ashamed of.” A plea. Always begging. He is asking for more than you have to give.

 

* * *

 

“Hey man, that was impressive,” Bucky turns to see Sam’s silhouette in the kitchen doorway. They’ve found a simple peace, living under the same roof, where they say very little to each other. Bucky’s still uneasy being himself around everyone but Steve.

Sam keeps his distance, bubble around Bucky’s chair, “what you did for Steve in Geneva.” Arms crossed, eyes respectful, “He gets in over his head sometimes, needs friends to pull him back out.”

“Yeah,” Bucky replies, too forced to be casual.

“I, uh— I know it’s hard sometimes, to move between home and war. At home all week then dodging bullets on the weekends. Like, when’s it gonna stop? You know?” Sam clears his throat, “But I just wanted to say, you seem like you’re doing really well. All that shit you went through, and you still managed to come home.” 

Sam’s face is solemn and open. He voices these things so easily. That must be what it feels like to be human, “A lot of guys really struggle with that. And you just seem— happy to be alive.”

Sam taps the counter with his palm, turns his head as if to go, but adds, “And it’s— you’re really good for Steve, you know that? He just lights up around you. It’s like— he sees you living and remembers that he can do that too,” Sam’s eyes are bright with something unspoken.

“Anyway, I guess I just wanted to say, life’s never easy, but a lot of things are going right,” he nods to himself and Bucky realizes that Sam is asking something of him, too, “But I know you know that. From what I’ve seen, you always find the bright side.”

He ducks his head as he leaves the room. Silence in the kitchen. _You’re really good for Steve, you know that?_  

An opinion. You know its name but it’s strange to hear one, and one spoken about you. As a person. Sam’s words spin in his mind. Words he can choose to own or discard. How do you know truth when you hear it?

 

* * *

 

These things simmer until they spit. You fit Steve like a glove. Hear his thoughts when he blinks them back. You take what you need when heads are turned and hear his rebuke in your mind. _No one will get hurt._ But that’s not true. _As long as it’s not you, Steve._ He is a part of you and friction between you will always find the surface, like shrapnel trapped under skin.

Two bodies, brushing elbows at the kitchen counter. Chopping green, orange, white with a pot steaming on the stove.

“Trust doesn’t have to be absolute. You can trust someone without trusting them with your life.”

“If I’m leading a mission, then those men are trusting me with their lives. What kind of leader am I if I can’t do the same with them?”

“One that lives to come home. Why does the guy that calls you never join you out there? He’s too smart.”

“Nick knows his strengths. And I know mine.”

“And what about the men you lead? What’re their strengths? Dying? Hold a gun to their heads and they’ll beg for their lives.”

“They’re only human.”

“Humans shouldn’t go to war. A soldier isn’t a human plus training. It’s a person missing their will to live.”

“That’s not true, Buck. It’s brave to risk your life for what you believe in. You know that. You’ve done it. You’re still doing it. They don’t want to die. It’s just— it’s a lot easier to kill than stay alive out there. Those guys do the best they can with what they have.”

“Steve, stop,” Bucky sets down the knife, arms braced against the counter in frustration, “It’s not about their best,” irritation in his voice, “That’s an excuse so you don’t have to say it. It doesn’t matter if they die, because you know you’ll finish the mission no matter what. You’ll die before you retreat.”

Bucky looks up at his face. It hurts Steve as much to hear it as it hurts him to say it, “You’ll put the mission above yourself and let somebody shoot you in the gut. And you’ll bleed out. Fall from the sky and drown.”

_You gambled and got lucky. The devil himself pulled you out of that river. And now he is your shadow. Tying up loose ends so they can’t strangle you. Killing them before they can kill you._

“They say you bring out the best in people. Do you believe that?” Bucky swallows the fever in his voice, _touching nerves now_ , “Because it’s true. That’s why you’re a symbol.”

_It’s the way people look up to you. Trust and loyalty. And you deserve it. But_ you _look at_ me _like that. Like you’d follow me. And it’s fucking terrifying._

Both of them standing rooted in place, like they’re looking in a mirror, “Well this is the best in me. Hold my gun to another head and pull the trigger. So you don’t have to. So you can live,” and that’s the end of holding back tears. They spill hot down his cheeks, pressure behind his eyes, “That’s what I am Steve. I am your gun.” Voice cracking, desperate sounds escaping through the gaps.

Emotion rushes and he gasps another breath, chest collapsing. Pull open your rib cage so he can see, “The best I can do,” a violent stab at his own chest with a single finger, “is take a bullet for you. I am your fucking shield.” Spitting anger and hopelessness. Steve’s looking at him like he can’t breathe and Bucky’s hands are shaking.

His voice drops. Truth is bleeding out your worst fears on the kitchen tile. _Go ahead, say the rest._

“I will die before you. I promise you that.” _There it is._

“No, Buck,” Steve’s reaching for him before the words leave his mouth, “Don’t say that,” Steve’s voice is hoarse, crackling through his throat. Wet, horribly sad eyes. 

“Come here,” and he’s leaning against the kitchen counter, one hand on either side of Bucky’s hips, a cage to protect him from himself. Bucky can’t catch his breath and he’s trapped here, a disappointed, broken Steve holding him in place.

He pushes away, tries to break through Steve’s arms, but—“Buck, hold on. I need to tell you something,” his hand is on Bucky’s hip now, pulling him back, “You mean so much to me. I don’t know how to tell you— You anchor me. You’re all I think about.” 

The sick, black tug in his chest won’t relent. Bucky’s hiccuping sobs, vision blurry with tears. “You’re so brave and bright, you have no idea. The way you see the world— It’s beautiful. I feel like I was blind before I got you back.” Steve’s words are little pricks in his chest. Spilling things he never wanted to hide from you, making this disaster worse. Bucky pulls away again, looking toward the hall. _I can’t do this right now_.

But Steve won’t let him go. One hand on his waist, pushing him back against the counter, the other lands soft on the curve of his jaw, gently pulling Bucky’s face closer to his own. 

Steve leans in, weight against him, hip to hip. “Bucky, wait. I— I need you to know—”

“Steve, fuck—” Bucky manages, a wrecked sob. His fingers on Steve’s chest, five points of pressure to say— _I just can’t do this right now._

_Please let me go._

Steve steps back. Could he look any more wounded? Bucky is out of the kitchen in three steps. Soft thunks on the carpet as he strides to the door. Twist it open. Gasp in the humid air.

Bucky trips into the neighborhood streetlight grey. Walks until it’s dark again, like night should be. Wipes tears on his shirt, sniffles in the blackness.

You should have known; it’s not always so easy to share secrets. If you could just leave them all stripped to pieces on a towel—

But some rip ragged holes in your chest on the way out. Stitch yourself together in the silence. Now you understand that the reveal is just the beginning. You are too exposed but there is no going back.

The second door opens and you are not alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there, dialog chapter! Hope you all are enjoying the story. :)
> 
> Captain America? More like World Champion of the Worst Possible Timing. Also, Steve inherited my inability to understand even the clearest rap lyrics.
> 
> I have put up a *tentative* total chapter count. It might change, but I MIGHT have had the entire fic planned since chapter 2.
> 
> So.


	13. Is It Cowardice or Compromise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A smattering of nods and Steve pauses, “We may have guest. Keep your eyes open. He’s on our side.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> Reunite by Isbells  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MEuh6Wrzcs

“Stay in groups of three. Two blast teams on the roof and four on the ground.”

A large circle of agents around Steve, grim faces. Two floors underground in the U.S. Embassy in Zagreb, Croatia. They’ll spend the next three hours in the back of an aging semi, lurching through the forest toward their newly discovered target: Hydra’s European communications bunker in the Dinaric Alps.

“You are not responsible for counting bodies. I will tell you when the building is clear. Detonate on my command. Language team stays with me in case they’re in the mood to cooperate.”

A smattering of nods and Steve pauses, “We may have guest. Keep your eyes open. He’s on our side.”

The team watches him with quiet eyes, a few more nods. They deserve a better explanation but Steve doesn’t have one. _He’s just here to make sure I don’t die._ Steve stews as he tightens the straps over his chest, fingers grazing Bucky’s stitches.

Fury’s voice over his shoulder, “Captain, why do I have a loose cannon wandering around in my mission?”

“I don’t know that he’s here, Nick.”

“You just told my men to look out for him. You have a hunch.”

“Better safe than sorry.”

“Funny that you say that because I tried to do the _safe_ thing in Geneva.”

Steve turns to face him, “You’re not going to lock him up, Nick.”

“I am if he compromises this mission.”

Steve darkens, spits with sarcasm, “Yeah he really hurt us in Geneva. We lost twelve good men trying to do it your way. He took out one Hydra scientist and saved us all. You just hate not being in control.”

“This is my mission, Rogers. These men report to me. They put their lives on the line. I don’t have time for some vigilante with stolen government tech.”

“Then I guess you’ll just have to trust me.”

Steve fastens his helmet in place, clasping the strap below his chin, “Besides, the government owes him a lot more than a couple of guns.” A steely look and he’s gone, scuffing up the stairs to the truck waiting in the lightless street.

They ride in silence and near darkness, packed side-by-side on narrow benches. Steve watches the upturned barrels of their guns gleam in the shadows and wonders if Bucky will show himself. He briefly questions if he has come at all, they will be miles and miles from any town, over a mile from the nearest road. But of course he has come. _Has he found a car? Is he hidden in this truck? Is he already there?_ He’ll find a way.

Steve had wanted to bring him along, talk to him on the flight over, smooth things over with Fury, try to persuade him to wait in the truck, or at the very least, keep him at arm’s length. But the second Steve answered his phone, Fury’s voice buzzing over the line, Bucky was gone. Vanished from his chair in the kitchen. Steve packed and waited for him. Called his phone and heard it buzzing on the couch. Stalled until they couldn’t anymore.

Grabbed a pen and a folded take out menu. Stood staring at it while Sam idled the car in the driveway. It would be a huge risk to write his destination. Just because Sam’s house hadn’t been raided yet didn’t mean it wouldn’t be. _Should I write it in code?_ Steve rubbed his forehead. _How did he know where I went before?_

“See you soon,” hopeful scribble and drop the pen. Not sure how soon.

He was silent in the car and worrying. They needed more time to talk things through.

 

* * *

 

Steve’s crouched in the dirt behind a concrete bollard. Three agents watching him, he can see the whites of their eyes, waiting for the signal. The mission is to blow up the building and destroy every subterranean cable. They have five hours before sunrise. No one has to die.

SHEILD is dead so they’re trying to play by the rules. Diplomatic standards. You don’t just walk into Croatia and blow up a building. You have to announce your intentions. Steve taps his chin and the four stand in unison. Steve’s voice barks out, sharp with a natural ferocity, “This is an armed seizure by the Integrated Intelligence Forces of the United States of America. You can surrender your weapons or we will proceed with force.”

The men in the dimly lit security booth jump and scramble. _They could be triggering a silent alarm._ “You have two seconds to exit the booth with your hands raised. One,” the men are yelling at each other, gesturing, “Tw—”

The count is killed by the deafening sound of gunfire. Flood lights flare sudden and blinding from the roof of the low building. Bullets clap and dent Steve’s shield. They’re falling back, hunching behind the concrete. Steve turns his head to see one agent face down, bullets following bullets into their body before blood can even rush from the wounds. Another is sputtering and gasping, both hands pressed to their chest. The third agent meets his eyes. Blank horror.

Steve should be moving, adapting. The entire team is in danger. But he’s staring at the body on the ground. _How does this keep happening? Where were the teams on the roof?_ Bucky’s words spin in his mind, seed of doubt. _I trust the men who fight with me. Maybe you shouldn’t._ Fury’s voice in his ear brings him back. They’ve lost both of the blast teams on the roof. Fall back. Repeat, fall back.

Anger and bitterness. _No._ Steve lifts his shield and steals a glance at the entrance. The gunfire has slowed. _Did they die for nothing?_ Finish the mission.

Steve pivots to the balls of his feet and tears toward the entry gate. No signal. No cover. No team. Bullets immediately pelting his shield, kicking up the dirt at his feet. He raises the shield overhead, bullets like rain, as he ducks under the overhang. Pry open the grooved door with the shield’s machined edge. Slip inside. The rush of air tells him, before he’s turned to see it, that he’s in a large, open space.

He dislodges his shield from the door and immediately flings it into the gloom. It ricochets twice and returns to him. One hydra agent knocked out, another disarmed. He throws it again, angling it off a storage container, and takes out two men crouched around the corner.

Adrenaline drives him and the single-minded flow of working alone takes over. He runs straight back, cutting through the cavernous room like there are no hidden threats. Look at how the room is arranged, for a wide path or lit corridor. This is just a transitory space. Find the control room.

Steve spots tell-tale elevator doors with a softly glowing keypad. He bashes the numbered pad from the wall with a single swipe of his shield. No plan in mind but he knows he has no time for delicacy. He yanks the wires from the back of the control and gets lucky. The doors open.

Buttons in reverse, numbers rising as they fall below the ground. Punch the most worn pad on the panel, eight floors down, and wait, thumb hovering over the controls, until you are two floors away. Hit the buttons for the seventh and ninth floors. When it stops, slip silently into the seventh floor hall. It is strangely office-like. Tile floor and drop ceiling. He jams his shield between the exterior doors, scans the layout as he waits for the elevator’s interior doors to close. It lowers itself to the eighth floor and Steve steps back on to the roof of the steel box.

The second the doors open again he can hear bullets biting the back wall. They stop quickly and he can hear their hushed, urgent voices. The doors close and the elevator drops again. By the time the elevator slows a third time, opening on the ninth floor for no one, all Steve can hear is the sound of boots retreating.

He heaves himself up a few feet and wedges the tip of his shield in the eighth floor doors. Empty hallway. Steve elbows the doors open and noiselessly pulls himself up, boots on the tile. He turns, looking for another clue to the control room’s location and feels the familiar press of metal on his temple.

A single Hydra agent, riot gear and a black helmet. Face fully covered but Steve imagines he can see the gleam in his eye. They’re both frozen. There is so much stillness in war. He can hear the clamor of agents already returning. No doubt every agent in the building. Steve wonders if the man behind the gun will pull the trigger before they arrive for the distinction: _I killed Captain America._

Suddenly, a flash of metal around the man’s neck. Metal fingers curl around the base of the visor and jerk his head back, exposing his throat. Silent and quick. Bucky’s right hand appears over his chest, finger on the trigger of a pistol. He buries the muzzle in the flesh under the man’s jaw and pulls the trigger. Muffled report and he lets the body fall. No exit hole in the helmet. Clean kill but for the blood pooling, spilling out onto the floor. _I am your gun._

Eyes lock. Steve hardly has time to take in how beautiful he looks. His sharp, clear eyes and the black cut of cloth over his face. The aggressive lines of his body armor.

Steve’s eyes are sweeping over his chest when Bucky lunges and tackles him to the floor. Knees skidding, Bucky backs them up into a recessed doorway. One arm across Steve’s chest, he twists and pulls Steve into his lap. Jerks the shield from Steve’s arm and wedges it into the tile floor at their feet.

No time to draw a breath before the bullets begin again. Hydra agents firing from down the hall, yelling through their helmets in a foreign language, spreading into an arc.

Bucky’s firing, precise shots, one at a time, over the rim of the shield. His shoulders are pushed into the doorframe and he’s braced around Steve like a cage. Knees bent, feet flat on the floor, Steve’s body between his legs. Steve’s face pressed against his chest. Steve’s legs curled in next to Bucky’s hips. And Bucky’s got his metal fingers woven in Steve’s hair, gentle pressure to hold him in place, shield his head.

In this moment, the two of them facing terrible odds with a single pistol, Steve considers his instincts for the first time. Sees himself and what he wants. He isn’t struggling, isn’t pulling away. He isn’t part of this fight. Just soaking in the closeness. Just deadweight on Bucky’s chest.

It feels right so he just gives in. Closes his eyes. Chest warm and full. And feels Bucky’s body working around him. Legs tensing, stomach tight, arms shifting to aim and fire. At peace here at war. Because this is the way it should be. The way it has always been. Steve will fight until he can’t anymore and then Bucky will finish it.

Guilt jumps up and grabs him by the throat. _Listen to yourself._ A truth too fragile to admit when his body was too fragile itself. But swallow your pride, you know it has always been this way. It has always felt wonderful when he protects you.

_Is that why you can’t stop?_ Any good man would want to fight for justice, but the consequences of failure are too grave for most. For you, failure just means a chance to get closer. He will fly to your side to deliver the fatal blow. And if it is not enough, then he’ll join you in death. Life slips easy in your chest like water in a glass and you will pour it out, just to feel him save you again.

Eyes closed, breathing in the heat and gunpowder. That’s right; a tug that reminds you there is a world where violence is not the norm. That you can go home again. That you have a reason to live. Laying there, helpless by choice, is it cowardice or compromise— _just give him what he wants—_ you realize the tug is Bucky.

A bullet zings into the wall behind them and Bucky slouches a bit lower. Barrel of the gun balanced on the top of the shield, chin ducked so Steve can feel Bucky’s breath in his hair. _I am your shield._

Bucky runs out of bullets and drops the gun at his feet. He heaves the two of them up for a second, reaching behind his shoulder blades, elbow exposed above the shield. He jerks with a muffled sound and settles again with an assault rifle in his grip. He fires it one handed, bullets spraying. Steve can feel the kickback reverberate in his chest. 

Silence rings, just as deafening as the gunshots. They’re still and Steve waits. Won’t break this embrace. Bucky lifts his metal hand and Steve raises his head. A look much too dark and close for a place like this.

They stand and Bucky walks among the dead. He tears a strip from a man’s pants with a jagged knife and ties it around his lower bicep, pulling both ends tight between his metal hand and his teeth. Blood drips from his fingertips. He was shot and barely made a sound.

Bucky heads down the hall and Steve follows him. They both know Steve won’t leave without completing the mission. Bucky says nothing so Steve says nothing. _The best I can do is take a bullet for you._

They’re halfway down another dimly-lit corridor when a single shot cracks in the narrow space. Steve instantly raises his shield, and before his eyes have even found the threat, Bucky has fired a return shot. He didn’t flinch, didn’t even stop walking. Thirty feet later they walk past a security guard in uniform grey and blue. Slumped in a doorway, gun loose in his hand. Single bullet wound in his forehead.

Steve’s stomach lurches. Something deeply unsettling knocks but doesn’t name itself. _He kills so quickly._ It’s startling every time. Bucky has always been an excellent shot but it’s not about the accuracy, it’s the ruthlessness. 

Bucky leads them directly to the control room. Four guards at the door that he takes out with four quick shots. Kick open the door. The final obstacle: two terrified technicians in front of four glowing screens. Clearly unarmed, hands already rising in surrender.

Two shots ring against the glass and metal. Heads kick back, blood sprays. Two dead men, bodies on the floor.

Steve starts and looks at Bucky. Clearly, this is Bucky’s mission now. ‘ _We’ll do it your way until someone gets a gun to your head. Then it’s blood and bodies, a path of death until we’re home again_.’ He searches what little he can see of his face. _They didn’t have to die._

Bucky walks forward, three seconds studying the status monitor, body silhouetted by glowing blue, “Data storage on the fourth floor, network infrastructure here on the eighth, power management on the twelfth.”

They make it all the way back to the entrance without seeing another breathing person. Maybe there are none left. Bucky pauses at the door, ear to the metal, and pulls it open. He walks straight past the security booth, eyes toward the tree line where what’s left of Fury’s team has retreated.

They reach the group side by side, half-way down a dirt embankment, half-hidden by tree trunks.

Bucky addresses them without removing his mask, “You, you, and you,” he points to a translator, a close combat specialist, and a sniper, “Two bags each. You to the fourth floor, you to the twelfth, and you as deep as you can go. Look for structural supports.”

The chosen three are looking between Steve and Bucky. Going in alone? Laying explosives? There are eighteen agents here, why send three? Why us? 

His reasons are too obvious to Steve. Bucky upends the mission because he doesn’t trust them. Use as few people as possible. Only those who never thought they’d be planting bombs. Don’t give them any time to think. Make them work alone. People like chess pieces.

Bucky walks past them to the pile of canvas bags full of HMX. He gathers four in his metal hand,  walks back toward the building with a parting remark, “Take out your earpieces. No talking.”

He’s halfway up the slope, rising toward the flood lights and everyone is watching Steve. It is unbelievably dangerous but you can’t be everywhere, see everything. You trust the man who can with your life. Steve nods once, jaw set, and turns to follow Bucky up the hill.

By the time they’re back at the door the three agents have caught up, explosives in hand. Bucky never looks back.

Bucky returns to the command room and Steve follows. He sets down the bags, takes Steve’s shield and bashes the lock from the first server chassis, pushes the door aside. Bucky hands the shield back wordlessly. Steve understands the command and moves to the next chassis, edge of his shield slicing through thick steel.

When he finishes exposing the humming servers, Bucky has already laid the explosives and is waiting at the door. He leads them back to the embankment. Not ten minutes pass before all three agents return.

Everyone retreats toward the truck, over a mile away. Shadowy figures weave through the trees, boots crunching leaves. When they’re outside the blast radius, Steve detonates the charge. Blinding light in the ashy sky. Dust and debris races and swallows them in a cloud.

 

* * *

 

They’re in a tent. It’s been so long and not long at all since the last time they were huddled under canvas in a European forest.

Steve has a military issue medical kit open next to a tiny electric light. Bucky’s sitting cross-legged, socked feet, on a rumpled sleeping bag with his arm resting on his knee. Steve has already pulled the bullet out; Bucky didn’t make a sound. Now’s he’s cleaning the wound, winding a bandage tightly around.

Some of the team will go back tomorrow, in the sunlight, to scan for underground cables. Steve won’t leave until the mission is complete and he knows Bucky will wait in the shadows, so— _please Buck, let me bandage that arm—I know—I know, you will. I just—want to. Please._

Steve stills but keeps his hands on Bucky’s arm. Bucky’s black cloth mask is loose under his chin, knotted around his neck. His face is easy, eyes warm. Steve’s surprised how much he likes seeing Bucky at war. Perhaps it’s the contrast. Seeing how hard he is, how vicious. And then he comes home again, curious eyes, grazing touches in the kitchen. The same hands that kill with no hesitation, wash the blood away and they’re drifting over fresh cut grass, curling loose when he falls asleep, feeling around Steve’s waist when they’re on the bike.

Possessiveness uncoils itself and loosens his neck. _Lean in and rest your forehead on his. Just breathe in the closeness. Hold him and touch his face._ You were too proud to admit that you needed him. That you have always loved when he stepped in, the violence under his skin sparking on your behalf.

Things have changed. He is darker, or perhaps there is less obscuring the darkness that has always been there. He kills and you live. Then he smiles at you and rolls your dress shirt sleeves and there’s nothing to hide behind. _What else could it mean?_

But you reached out to hold him and he pushed you away. _Fall back, fall back._

“Why did they have to die? The men in the control room,” Steve breaks the silence.

“Should I wait until they have a gun to your head?”

“They were unarmed.”

“They’d have guns next time.”

“What do you mean?”

“They won’t make that mistake twice. The next time you found them, they’d have guns.”

“There wouldn’t be a next time. We take prisoners back for the Justice Department to deal with.”

Bucky’s eyes narrow, “And where do you think they go? No one in Hydra stays locked up. Two months and they’re free men.”

Steve releases his arm, questioning something unspoken, “And maybe they’ll choose a new life.”

Bucky looks away, “That doesn’t happen. Bad gets worse.”

“But they deserve a second chance.”

“Yeah,” Bucky’s voice harsh, “a second chance to kill you.” Here it comes again, the same argument. Steve takes the opportunity to catch Bucky off guard, say something he’s meant to.

“Buck, when you fell off the train,” the sudden change of subject has Bucky blinking at him, “I swore I wouldn’t stop until all of Hydra was dead or captured.” Emotions bubble so close to the surface; they just slip out before you can swallow them. “I died trying— and I’m glad I didn’t kill them all,” he waits for the words to settle, “or I wouldn’t have you now.”

Bucky’s face is dark with concern and surprise. He shakes his head, “You’re not always going to get so lucky.”

“Maybe not. I say it’s better to let live and I’ll take my chances.”

Bucky looks down at his lap.

“You’re more than what they made you. I know you know that,” Steve’s voice gentle.

“They didn’t make me. We made ourselves.”

Now Steve is quiet and Bucky looks up, “They didn’t put that in my file, did they? How they chose me?” The path to a well-worn argument has led them some place entirely new. The air is weightless with revelations.

“I don’t remember much after the fall. I think a couple of months had passed. They hadn’t—” Bucky gestures with his left hand, “I only had one arm.”

He adjusts, pulling one knee up and into his chest.

“I woke up with a black bag over my head. Really cold, I haven’t been cold like that since. 

They said something about a mission and gave me this ultimatum: kill a man or be killed. They said they didn’t need me anymore, but if I could prove my worth—”

Bucky stops, eyebrows knitting. He’s never climbed this far into a dark memory with Steve.

“And you know what. I thought about it. I thought—I’ve killed before. I can do it again. They pulled off the cloth—” 

_A readiness to kill cannot be taught, only the relative power of that instinct can be manipulated._

Bucky passes a hand over his mouth, “and I was kneeling next to someone, masked the same way. They threw a revolver at my feet and I picked it up. But I’m looking at him, and something’s— wrong. I asked what he had done to deserve it but, obviously— he hadn’t done anything. He was just like me.”

_The asset demands nothing._

“And I’m staring at him thinking, why doesn’t he say something? Why doesn’t he beg? He wasn’t even shaking—”

_He needs no dogma, no leader. He does not need to believe._

“And Steve,” Bucky meets his eyes, they’re hollow and rimmed red, “he was so small. Thin shoulders and skinny legs. And I just thought of you,” Bucky drops his head, hair covering his face, “So brave. Too ready to die. And I couldn’t do it.”

_Only a man who is already willing to sacrifice his life can achieve that purity of purpose; a man who fights not to survive, but to protect._

Bucky’s voice drops, he’s curling in on himself, “I was so— ashamed, thinking what you would have thought of me. I’m holding the gun and this guy’s just, waiting for my bullet. I thought that was it— it was all over. I dropped the gun and said no. Heard somebody give the order to kill us both and— everything just— sharpened,” Bucky draws a narrow path with his hands away from his face. 

_A man who fights not to survive_. A thousand back alley fights. Fists to teeth. Boots to bones. _Not to survive_. Guilt forces the air from his lungs.

“I was moving before I knew what I was doing. There was only one bullet in the gun, but I killed at least ten guards. Took a couple pistols off the dead. Shattered something and stabbed one of them with a shard.”

_A more poetic man might say: he is the essence of man’s will to fight for something more than himself._

Bucky is silent for a long time, staring at his feet. Replaying things behind his eyes he won’t put into words.

“I wasn’t even trying to escape. I tried to pull back the hood on the other guy but there were too many guards— I don’t know. Maybe I thought it was you.” 

Steve’s been watching his face so intently that he hadn’t noticed Bucky shaking. Shoulders hitched up to his ears, skin trembling.

“Whatever they made me, it came from inside,” his voice doesn’t shake, though. Firm with a known truth.

Steve cracks— _you are always choosing the worst moments_ , but isn’t that when the words come easy? When you have no choice?

“No, Buck,” Steve reaches out for him, hand on the arm around his knee, “it came from me,” and Steve feels tears already threatening, “All this time I thought you just got unlucky. But they picked you for a reason,” the words from Zola’s horrible letter spilling from his mouth, “because you don’t fight for—”

Steve draws a ragged breath, Bucky looks up at the labored sound, clear eyes searching, and there’s too much space between them. Steve reaches out, both arms around his waist, and pulls him in. Bucky comes easily. Until Steve’s got his face pressed to Bucky’s hair, Bucky’s hips between his legs. And Bucky’s hand comes to rest on Steve’s knee.

Now that you can feel the rhythm of his breath against your ribs, give him what he deserves, “You fight for me. To save me. And I’ve made you do it so many times,” Steve breathes in through the pressure in his throat, soft scent of Bucky’s hair, “You learned to live with your ear to the ground. Always ready to fight.”

Whisper now, lips so close to his ear because you can’t say it to his face, “Letting you fall from the train wasn’t the worst thing I’ve done to you. It was picking fights I couldn’t finish. It was making the war our home.”

Bucky is still and Steve breathes it out, “Can you forgive me?”

The two of you, pulling the black cloth from over your own heads. The world is too cold but you have each other. Look down at yourself and see what you really are. An aching need. A half that wants to be whole. Look at yourself and see a promise so old it is truth. A truth you built your life around. The sun rises and Bucky protects you.

“Don’t apologize,” Bucky’s voice is just as quiet. Barely breathing sounds to each other, “We are what we wanted to be. That’s nothing to be ashamed of. Don’t apologize for that.” His voice cracks around the final words. His hand tightens on Steve’s knee, slides around the edge, and he pulls it closer. Deeper into Steve’s embrace.

They hold each other in the dim light. Every conversation, even a painful one, brings a wonderful release. To share with him is like letting a fearsome, ugly thing out into the light and seeing it vanish. Monsters that were made of smoke after all.

Steve whispers again, words just for him, “I want you next to me.”

Bucky breathes out, answers easily like he was thinking the same thought, “All you’re going to get is an earpiece. I don’t follow orders.”

Steve laughs softly, his nose tipping against Bucky’s ear. It sends a ripple of want through his stomach and Bucky’s head tips back a touch. “That’s fine. Perfect. I just want to know where you are.” Steve breathes into his hair, “I have something to protect too.”

They settle back into stillness. Breathing in each other’s arms. Steve works up the nerve to pull back, before Bucky can find a reason to leave, and motions to the sleeping bag, “Lay down.” Just tell him what you want, don’t ask, and maybe he’ll stay. _Please, Buck._

Bucky shifts onto his knees, cool air rushing between their bodies, and shuffles to the edge of the unzipped bag. He lays down with his face toward the tent, soft curve of his spine, one foot tucked under the opposite ankle. Steve flicks out the light and follows him, maybe a little too eager, curling around him as he stills. Arm tight around his waist to tell Bucky he meant everything he said.

Bucky can probably feel his heart racing through their shirts. He breathes in the sweet smell at the nape of his neck, gunpowder and Brooklyn summers, and stifles a sigh. Closeness he’s longed for, so perfect and warm. Heady lightness in his veins as they fall off into sleep.

 

* * *

 

Steve wakes before him. Consciousness coming slowly, he lays still and feels. Surprise that Bucky is still there and some form of surprise that sends his stomach twisting that Bucky is so close. He’s on his back, hip pressed to Steve’s side and he’s got a leg over both of Steve’s. His ankle tucked around the outside of Steve’s calf. To pin him down it seems. Alert him if Steve tries to slip away, run back to fight without his shadow. _Don’t worry Buck, I’m not going anywhere without you._

This is when you draw a breath and realize you are missing pieces. You were once solid and now you are floating. Your lungs breathe to speak his name, your heart beats to move this body closer to his, your mind spins to paint his image again and again. Think of what to say, what he needs, how to make him laugh. He appears and you forget. Every time. Watch his face, peaceful with sleep, and know that two hearts must beat for you to live.


	14. So Live with the Discord

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The world reels sickly yellow around him. He hesitates and it feels like vomiting. Unnatural and horrifying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> Atlantis to Interzone by The Klaxons (Crystal Castles Remix)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Otk1tzb0xvA
> 
> Here are some pictures of elevated warehouses, in case the visuals are helpful as you read!  
> http://thesixthborough.weebly.com/uploads/2/4/5/2/24528142/5889148_orig.jpg  
> http://www.portseattle100.org/images/properties/t86/P86%20Import%20Cars%20750814.jpg

After all the pushing and pulling—both of you heaving blame onto your own shoulders, trying to understand why things are the way they are. Why you cannot live like men who would die shaking under the barrel of a gun. Gripping each other and saying, _no you don’t understand, it is me. I am this way. I will always be this way—_ you are new men in a new place.

You made yourselves and it doesn’t matter how it happened. Here you are. Breathing thin air, sitting side by side in a private jet. Steve’s got a crossword puzzle in his lap. He’s reading clues aloud and turning to Bucky with one eyebrow raised, like he’s going to have any idea what classic toothpaste was featured in Grease.

He meets Steve’s eyes for the warmth there, _Steve, how could you ever be anything else?_ Smiles and shakes his head, “I have no idea.”

Traveling is a destination for the two of you. Others cover their eyes, slump in their seats, block out the world and sleep. But the two of you steep in the inescapable closeness. Map every crease around his eyes when he smiles. How the sun catches his eyes and makes them glow. Beautiful blue. Catalog the tell-tale quirk of his lips when he tells a dry joke. 

Watching him smile when the thought swims up, in the fractured flow of consciousness— _lean in and learn that quirk with your tongue_. The shock of longing in his stomach is immediate and breathtaking. A kind of pleasure all its own. The scene plays out in his mind, desire offers no explanation. _Close the distance when Steve looks up. Pause, soft breath over his lips. Then flick your tongue over the corner of his lips_ —lust swirls under his ribs— _just meeting the sensitive crease. Press a kiss to the swell of his lower lip. His lips will part and he’ll turn into you, hand on your jaw to pull you close. Chasing something deeper. Meet him and taste_ —Bucky draws a sudden breath, staring at the seat back.

Emotion is just liquid in your chest until it takes shape. Pushes everything aside, names itself, and stakes its claim. Weight in your stomach. Buzz in your mind. An electric current through your veins when he speaks.

Want takes shape and smirks at you.

Steve reads another clue and looks up. Their eyes meet and— _Steve, I’m looking through you_. How happy he is to have Bucky there, at his side. How he looks away with a small, irrepressible smile when he makes Bucky laugh. How his eyes rest clear and ernest on his face when Bucky tells him something new. The whole world in two plane seats. 

You joined his team. You’re by his side. He will introduce you to the others and they’ll nod like you signed up for this. And is it for you or is it for him? Two pieces of glass pushed together, you can’t tell where he ends and you begin. You see all of each other and nothing else. _Steve, there are hollow-point bullets in my gun. I am here because you want me here. But I am vicious and I cannot change that. I am hard enough to save you; I can’t be soft enough to have you._

 

* * *

 

Shimmering waterfront. Why this had to be done at mid-day Bucky has no idea. Fury said something about shipping activity and noise ordinances, but all Bucky hears is an unnecessary risk.

Steve and Sam are crouched by the base of the target, an [elevated warehouse ****](http://www.eveandersson.com/photos/usa/or/portland-willamette-river-grain-elevator-large.jpg)designed to drop cargo directly onto the decks of ships below. Reports say there’s a powerful Hydra weapon hidden inside. _So we’re going to try to get it back before they can set it off_ — Steve’s voice in his mind.

Bucky’s tucked out of sight on a nearby roof. He’s been given a sniper’s post and he keeps an eye on the area assigned to him, but mostly watches Steve through the scope of his rifle. Steve and Sam are waiting for the signal that the stairway to the warehouse is clear. They’re leaning against a sun-bleached fence and Steve is gesturing, telling some story, bodies moving easy with laughter.

It’s mesmerizing. That’s a quiet pleasure he doesn’t have to voice, watching Steve from a distance on missions. The strength and grace of his movements. The way he’s aware of everyone around him. How he takes on the toughest fights by himself.

Bucky is uneasy about the location. This factory has been in disuse for over 20 years. There’s a rusting container ship below the warehouse but all the chutes have been removed. Bucky is sure the place is full of unprotected drop points, ten stories to free fall before you smash into the ship’s steel deck.

Suddenly, Steve’s voice in his ear, warm with laughter, “Hey what was that movie? With the kid that gets inside the movie world?”

Bucky starts. Mission mind and he forgets how recall things like that. He’s not used to this, bringing his heart to the fight. Through the scope he can see Steve scanning the rooftops for him. Feeling a little off balance he replies, “Last Action Hero.” His voice has a hard edge that’s unavoidable when speaking from behind a gun.

“Yeah! That’s right.”

Sam is nodding too. At Bucky’s request, his earpiece only transmits to the two of them.

He watches them through the scope and stills the nervous wave in his stomach. It is sunny today but the sky is loosing pinprick drops of rain that he can feel in his hair, on his hand. This is not who you are in this body armor. But Steve is here, talking in your ear, and you are noticing things you shouldn’t be.

They get the signal to enter and Bucky is already on his feet, leaving his post without a second thought. He’s on the factory’s roof before Steve is inside. He watches through a blown out skylight, sprawled on the corrugated metal, rifle pushed into his shoulder.

Sure enough, there are exposed drop points everywhere. Jagged voids in the walls and the floor.

Steve and Sam take out a group of five guards easily. They’re barely ten steps inside when a more menacing obstacle appears. A man in a mechanical suit, almost entirely covered in wires and metal plates. A clumsier, more obviously weaponized version of Iron Man. He leads a column of agents dressed in the local military's dark olive uniforms through the door with a shower of bullets, machine guns for arms.

Sam takes on the agents and Steve the man in the suit.

Cold calculations present themselves and Bucky twists to apply them, like working in two languages at once. The easiest way to kill Sam would be to drop from above, knife from behind. _Work backward_ —so he can probably take all seven agents if he keeps his back to the corner. Bucky estimates Sam can take three non-fatal shots before he can no longer defend himself. The best way to take down Steve is to keep him on the ground, limit his options with the shield, pin him in one spot. _Pivot_ —so take out anyone that boxes him in, give him a clear line back to the shield.

Build new pathways in your mind. Give yourself this: you are resilient.

But that doesn’t make it easy. It’s different now. Knowing that Steve knows he’s there, knows he’s watching him. _What is your role here?_ Calculations rip the conflict to his skin all over again. If he knows you are here, why do you hesitate? Kill the man in the suit with a single shot— _Steve doesn’t want him to die, he’d say he’s just following orders._ Then drop to the floor and take him out yourself— _This isn’t my fight. I’m just here to make sure failure doesn’t mean death._ And if it comes without warning? You’ll just be laying here when his heart stops. Like you’re up here just to watch.

An agent breaks past Sam and turns toward Steve with his gun rising into position. Bucky puts two bullets in his neck, just below the lip of his helmet, no hesitation. So he can die? Does that make you a hypocrite? _Steve has his hands full. One at a time._

Steve is looking for weak points in the suit but he’s too busy deflecting bullets to throw his shield. He’s backing up, turning, backing up, and he’s getting perilously close to the drop point under Bucky’s sky light. He steps back again and runs out of room. Boots on the edge but Bucky has already jumped.

Bucky’s falling straight down, boots first, angling toward Steve, watching him lose his balance, his arms whipping out to grasp something, anything.

Bucky’s right hand wraps around Steve’s shoulder strap—a quick calculation, he can probably break those fingers and still hold on but he needs his metal hand to stop their fall with the edge of the floor. He connects, four points pierce the floor and the full force of their momentum slams through his frame. Something in his shoulder gives with a sickening pop. The pain rips a horrible sound from deep in his chest. 

Mission mind doesn’t flinch. He jerks his metal arm and flings them both back up through the gap. Steve lands rough a few feet away but Bucky’s eyes are already crawling over the man in the suit. Target found: throat plate.

Bucky’s spent enough time weaving in and out of war to know the man will immediately turn his attention back to Steve, the opponent he knows. He feeds the enemy’s instincts by turning and sprinting to the side, fleeing the hail of bullets that will soon begin. The suit lumbers around to face Steve. 

Without slowing, Bucky grips a column and whips himself around in a tight turn. Two steps and he’s leaping, landing on the suit’s over-built shoulders. He reaches around with his left hand to the weak seams of the throat plate. It was clearly an afterthought and the welding is sloppy. Bucky’s fingers hook over the top edge and he throws himself forward, ripping the plate free with the force of his body weight. He drops it, lands on his feet, and closes metal fingers around the now exposed neck of the man inside. Violence is grace.

_That’s enough_. Now close your fist and end it. His fingers tighten and he can hear the man struggling for breath. The gasps that will deteriorate to choked pleas that will fall silent as the blood pools and life slips away. _But this is not your mission_. And Steve doesn’t want this man to die.

The world reels sickly yellow around him. He hesitates and it feels like vomiting. Unnatural and horrifying. Will you let a threat live? How many chances will give him? You joined the team so play by their rules. Steve wants it this way. _Steve wants a lot of things that will hurt him._

Bucky draws a gun from his hip, cocks it, and pushes the metal barrel to the man’s purpling throat. _This is a mistake._ This is a risk. “You have 10 seconds to get out of this suit,” he growls. There is no spoken ‘or else’; it is the cold ring of metal pressed to the man’s pulse. Less of a threat and more of a promise. Bucky releases his grip, takes half a step back and begins, “10.”

Immediately, the machine quiets, he’s switched it off. “9.” The man’s arms are retreating through the exoskeleton. “8” Two panels click open in the back. “7” He struggles a moment to free his feet from their holds. “6” Bucky walks around to the side, his aim rises to the man’s head as he backs out of the suit. “5” The man turns to face him, hands rising, fingers outstretched and shaking.

He’s small. Probably the only one small enough to fit in the suit. From his build, Bucky guesses he’s more of a technician than a soldier. Bucky grips the man’s jacket in a metal fist and pushes the gun to his temple. The technician makes a small pathetic sound. _You never should have gone to war._

Bucky looks up and finds Steve, still sprawled where he threw him. Propped on one elbow, watching with quiet admiration. He gives Bucky a proud smile that lands like a punch. Soak in the praise and fight down the nausea that knows this man will be back. You joined the team so live with the discord.

Bucky drags the man to Fury's agents watching the entrance. Hands him over without a word and returns to Steve’s side. Too hard to return to the rooftops once he’s gotten close. 

Sam’s subdued every agent and the three of them make their way through the length of the warehouse. Steve leads and Sam and Bucky flank him. Bucky’s heart speaks up, uninvited, and reminds him that he needs to thank Sam. For keeping Steve safe when he couldn’t.

An anxious push tells him to shut those thoughts away. It’s too quiet. They’ve crossed through three rooms now with no guards. Just two more rooms and they’ll have walked the length of the building. How big is this weapon supposed to be? Shouldn’t it need more protection than this?

They’re weaving through stacks of wooden shipping pallets when Bucky hears the slightest rustle. A mouse or someone that knows how to move like one. 

He draws his gun as he turns. There’s a woman with straight red hair, dark olive uniform, gun drawn, leveled at his head. That’s enough information to act: enemy. Bucky knows his edge— _no hesitation_ —and he’s already closing his finger around the trigger when doubt wraps its black hands over his eyes. Her face. Mind racing. _How do you know her?_ Past enemies now allies. _Was she with Steve?_ His instincts scream— _too late you have already made the wrong choice_ —but his mind is shouting— 

“Stop! Stop! Bucky!” or maybe that voice is Steve’s. Arms wrapped around his elbow, tugging frantically. He’s leaning in, desperately trying to catch Bucky’s eye. And there are more forceful hands around him. One at his neck and one around his waist. Ripping him backward. He lands on Sam, who doesn’t trust his words to stop anything.

No time to regroup. “The weapon is armed,” the woman’s voice is cool, “I hope you guys brought the wings because we have less than a minute.”

They’re yelling, scrambling, sprinting toward the exit. Urgency like blinders. Bucky is kicking himself for the lapse— _you can’t rely on others to save you._ Sam’s yelling that he can’t launch from the staircase and there’s no time to get to the roof.

“Fall through a drop point.” 

Sam throws a look over his shoulder, wide-eyed, “They’re too narrow, man.”

“Catch us on the way down,” Bucky grabs Steve’s shoulder strap and jumps, throwing them through gape in the wall.

Sam’s voice chases them, “Not enough time!”

Face composed as death rushes up to meet them. He is calmest when he has Steve’s life in his hands. Bucky pulls Steve to his chest, a fierce embrace, as they accelerate, air rushing loud in their ears. If Sam doesn’t make it, he will break Steve’s fall.

But Sam is following them down, not a second later, red-haired woman clinging tight. He grabs Steve’s foot, another interrupted fall snapping through their tendons, nausea and blink away the stars. Sam’s struggling, wings flexing to pull this much weight. He has done enough, though. Bucky estimates that both of them could survive the fall from here.

“Let go,” Bucky yells over the wind to Sam, and Steve’s shouting as soon as the words leave his mouth, “Bucky, no!” He’s trying to pre-empt a sacrifice but Bucky doesn’t gamble. This is the safest way. Drop now like deadweight so you can control the fall. Break your legs to protect your spine. Don’t leave it to fate and the twisting of Sam’s wings.

Sam lets go. He has no choice. He coils himself, the woman slipping dangerously lower on his chest, and throws them to the side with a savage sound. Their heads whiplash together as they sail in a wide arc, just clearing the ship’s deck. The force of the throw sends Sam and the woman spiraling the other direction, wings twisting as they drop. Bucky gasps a breath just before they hit the water and loses it in a rush of bubbles, the sharp smack of collision in his bones as they disappear below.

Eyes up, toward the sunlight, kicking their way to the surface when the explosion blooms. Flames lick out the sun and black clouds billow. The shockwave is deafening, even underwater. 

Bucky doesn’t release his grip until he’s got them both back above water. Gasping and choking on mud and ash.

 

* * *

 

“No it’s fucking unacceptable—” Bucky’s voice is harsh and rising, “You didn’t send a single scout? It ran on fucking electricity and you didn’t do a scan?”

“Get the fuck out,” Fury sneers, the eye he can see lidded with disdain. Face shadowed in this tiny underground safe house, “I don’t need this shit from you.” It was meant to be a debrief but—

“Yeah, no one questions you, right?” Bucky’s too close, leaning into his space. “And you’ve got a great track record. How many men have died on your watch?”

“You show me how to win a war without death,” Fury’s voice drops. Steve, the red-haired woman, and Sam stand too still by the back wall, the way people do when they are too close to a conflict.

“This isn’t a war,” Bucky steps back, disgust in his voice that he does nothing to hide, “it’s a purge.” 

There is a familiar violence in Fury’s eyes, the arrogance of men with power.

“The mission is to die,” Bucky’s voice is tipped and ragged, chin lowered, eyes spitting. Anger is ugly. “You know there are Hydra operatives deep in every government agency. You can’t smoke them out so you lure them with an _opportunity_ ” he drops the word like an obscenity, “to sabotage. You put out a call for special agents, deep cover. They come and you let the mission go to hell to see who makes it out alive.”

Fury’s face is cold. He says nothing and Bucky hates him for his detachment.

Why hide behind moral purpose? Bucky sees stark reality and speaks it, “Your men are replaceable. Every single one of your missions is compromised. And when the traitors show their faces, you send them to their death and feel nothing.”

Show him how transparent he is. Speak truth to power and crush the authority that blinded and bound you. Bucky’s body shakes with conviction.

“The lookout team at the far end of the warehouse. No one called them back.” All the other agents and the thin Hydra technician had survived the blast inside an armored van. “You knew the bomb was armed. You sent them to die a convenient death. And you think that means your hands are clean?”

Bucky steps back and lets the words hang. War is pain and you should pay for it. At least you see dead faces in your dreams. At least you remember their last choked sounds. And he sits here in his safe house and gambles many lives to end a few. He kills and where is his guilt?

The silence is taut. Brace yourself for the snap.

Bucky waits with black eyes. Too angry. The savage pulse threatens to break him and he thinks of the first time he tried to kill this man. Finish it and save Steve seven times over. He is a greater threat than any Hydra agent. Kill the man that calls Steve to war.

But you chose this. Bucky snarls at the friction he can’t resolve, upper lip curling. You joined the team and put a wire in your ear. So walk away and live with the discord. Steve doesn’t want it so just walk away.

_Are you your own person? Or do you just do what Steve wants?_

No. 

If you just gave Steve what he wanted, he’d already have you. You’d already have him.

Bucky spins, shoulders tense. Slams the door on his way out. He isn’t followed.

 

* * *

 

They take a plane back over the Atlantic that evening. Hushed voices, sharing a bag of dried fruit as the sun sets and the clouds glow gold and pink. They talk about anything but the mission. 

Bucky is clumsily retelling the plot of a movie they watched last week. Steve alternately nodding and furrowing his brow in thought. He is always mixing up characters and storylines, asking Bucky to remind him, “—who did that? —and who was the bad guy? —oh right, and they were in Australia. Yeah, yeah.”

They watch a lot of action movies, a sad and strange irony that neither of them can quite joke about. Normal people have reality TV and you have this. Laugh at death. Reverent eyes. What entertainment must be.

You came home to the cage so live with the discord of watching others win praise for doing what you desperately try to forget you’ve done. Scenes that could stand in for your nightmares. Watch the hero choke a man until he passes out and think— _a better man would have just killed him_. Watch men die and know that no one will come for their bodies. The enemy never has a family.

But Steve seems to enjoy them. Maybe he sees himself there. Maybe he just likes happy endings.

Now Bucky watches each film to recite it. He consumes to regurgitate. Does Steve actually forget or does he just like to hear you retell it? Bucky has Steve’s dark blue combat pants rumpled in his lap. He’s murmuring a synopsis of Running Man and mending a long tear in the right leg.

The plane is full of men and women that know Steve by name, all headed back to D.C., and Bucky wouldn’t argue if Steve asked him not to. But Steve is still trading touches and smiling at him with no filter. So maybe mending his clothes isn’t too intimate for a public place.

The sun sets and their voices hush to whispers as people disappear under blankets, pillow their heads on jackets. The cabin lights go dark around midnight, though really there is no time in planes. You disconnect from time and float. Then land and take the numbers on your phone as truth.

Bucky falls asleep with his head dropped toward his left shoulder, closer to Steve. Just a few minutes pass— _do those even exist here?_ —and Steve is settling closer. Bucky is a light sleeper, even lighter than Steve thinks. Awake again at the slightest movement. 

Steve shifts, no arm rest between them, so their legs are pressed together, hip to knee. Bucky is still, a nervous trill in his stomach. He slumps sleepily to rest his head against Steve’s shoulder. Steve leans in, turns his head—he will leave no touch unreturned, whether you’re awake or not—and rests his cheek on top of Bucky’s head. His hand falls from his lap to rest where their legs meet. Knuckles against Bucky’s thigh.

Want holds your breath.

 

* * *

 

“Steve, can you— be more selective,” Bucky’s voice falls, it doesn’t feel right, but he continues, “with the missions?” He looks up to meet Steve’s eyes, “I’m not asking you to say no. Just— to think about— if they really need you there.”

“Yes,” his immediate reply. Steve’s voice adds something he won’t say, “I’ll be more selective.” A short pause, “Absolutely, Buck.”

 

* * *

 

They’re sitting the kitchen, drinking tea because routine is soothing, talking about Bucky’s growing houseplant collection.

“Where did they all come from?”

“Some I saved—”

“Saved?”

“Yeah, just found them on the sidewalk on trash day. Some I dug up. That one,” he points to a small fern, “I rescued from the airport.”

Steve looks at him, “You rescued it.”

“It was in the customs office. There are no windows in there. It wasn’t getting any sun.”

“You stole that plant from the airport.”

Bucky gives him a grin that makes Steve’s eyes flicker, “I rescued it.”

Steve shakes his head, “How did you get a plant home without me noticing?”

“I put it in my bag.”

“Your bag isn’t that big.”

“I’m an efficient packer.” There’s a black joke here about how Bucky only packs guns and grenades, but he lets it pass unspoken.

Steve’s smiling, amused, “Why do you want them?”

That gives him pause. It’s not about want, is it? “I like to see them grow,” he circles through his thoughts, “Do you know, when a plant is wilting— and you give it water? It goes vibrant green, so green it looks unreal. And all the leaves stand up,” he makes a V with his hands, “to find the sun.” Bucky scans the plants, a little row of life renewed by the window, “That’s beautiful.”

Sam rounds the corner and they both jump. Leaning back, looking down, like they’ve been caught. Feeling strangely exposed at home.

 

* * *

 

You live without a noun to name you. More than friends, right? You have no external measure. Is this what friends do? And what about this? What about the closeness, what is that? They live without labels because there is no one else in their world. Around others you’d have to commit. _Are you or aren’t you?_

Float in the space between words, stretch past the limits of language. And what might have been swallowed in confusion now blooms. Who will judge you? Do what you want.

The movie ends and the credits crawl up the screen. Steve turns to him with a question, sleep clearly settling around his eyes. It’s late and that’s when you stop needing an excuse.

Steve’s laying across the length of the couch, feet resting in Bucky’s lap. There was an excuse for this closeness once but Bucky can’t remember it now. Another unspoken rule; once done it can be repeated.

Bucky replies and shifts a bit to face him. His hand falls to a hole in Steve’s sock. Skin on skin as he makes a mental note to darn it on laundry day. Steve makes a ticklish sound and jerks his foot away. Bucky catches it easily, smirking, “Aren’t you supposed to have super reflexes?”

Steve smiles back and Bucky pushes his thumb into the ball of his foot, asking permission. 

“Ah—hah—” Steve’s face contorting, smiling, grimacing at the sudden sensation. Bucky strokes a firm line down to his heel and Steve responds with sounds of pleasure and pain.

Is that an excuse? Good enough. Want guides your hands.

Bucky pulls Steve’s foot back to his lap and sweeps his thumbs over the arch. Fingers trail back to his ankle and knead the indents around the bone. He cups Steve’s heel, fingers searching around the edge for tender spots.

Steve keeps talking about the movie, questioning the hero’s tactics, a steady stream of sound to say— _don’t stop._

But eventually he runs out of words, when Bucky is stroking the sensitive skin under his toes, and asks, “What are you thinking about?”

Bucky considers a second, _I’m thinking about the sounds you make when you feel good_ —“About how I only have five fingernails. And I wonder if my body knows that. Like, the energy that I was using to grow those other fingernails, where does it go? Do my nails grow twice as fast now?” he answers his own question with a roguish smile and Steve stares. That clear glass look. The way his eyebrows lift and his eyes soften. Thoughts written all over his face. _Steve, I’m looking through you. Jesus Christ._

The doorbell chimes and they both jump. Bucky drops his feet immediately. Surprise flushing hot over his face. Steve goes to the door and Bucky tries to catch his breath. What are you doing? Hiding in the dark?

It’s the woman with the red hair. Natasha. They sit in the kitchen and Steve makes more tea. She asks if she can stay the night and Steve answers without hesitation, “Of course, of course take my room.”

They talk and Bucky listens. Feeling too unsteady to put on a face for someone other than Steve. She asks Steve how things have been and he talks about everything but the elephant in the room, the quiet man in the chair at the table. What’s he been up to? _Oh, well— helping out Fury obviously. Some downtown functions. But, uh— some down time, too. You know._

They circle around the subject. It’s strange to see someone else pushing Steve’s buttons, pinning him down with words.

Then she pivots abruptly and asks, “So you’re ready to join the world then?”  

“Hey, I’m—”

“Get out of the house?” she interrupts before he can answer, teasing smile.

“Oh, I—”

“Ask out Sharon?” and the question smacks into silence. A wooden pause and Steve stutters something, tries to laugh it off. Bucky stares into his mug. Want rattles behind his rib cage and sends up a plea— _no, no, no_.

Natasha’s eyes are sharp on Steve’s face, so he continues, “No, I’m— I’m not looking— I’m— There’s a lot— going on. Right now.”

Bucky’s chest crumples in on itself. His mind turns, steadier than his heart— _Am I in the way?_ They are always together; there is no space for another. _That’s right,_ want whispers, _as it should be_.

He muffles the voice. Tumult is everywhere. No anchor. War is not what it was and neither is peace. There is no rest, only questions. What are you doing? Who are you? Just want and guilt, gripping your forearms, straining your frame, threatening to split you.

Blink back to the present and Steve is disappearing from the kitchen. Your ears replay the last few words he spoke— _going to get clean sheets_ —and now it’s just you and Natasha.

One of the rules of blending in is letting others speak first. Mirror their tone, their posture, follow their lead in conversation and feel them out. But here, Bucky speaks first.

“I shot you.”

She laughs, an intelligent sound, “Ну и что?”

“I’m sorry,” and he means it. For all the shots he took and almost took. Using English because the last time he spoke Russian he was claiming her as his to kill.

She asks him, in English, what he thinks of D.C. and he follows Steve’s lead. Talking about everything but the person his life revolves around. Grocery shopping, movies, listening to records, going to the zoo. Her eyes are warm and he’s feeling steady enough to make a joke about chasing Steve around the world.

“I know what that feels like,” she’s smiling with her eyes. A pause, then, “You’re doing really well, I hope Steve tells you that. When I started over I didn’t know who I was and I never really— figured that out,” she lets down her guard. A moment of vulnerability for a vulnerable man, “Nothing in here to hide,” she points to her chest, “makes for a good spy. But seeing you here, with Steve?” she quirks an eyebrow, “I see what could have been. You came home. That’s not easy.”

Where does Steve find these people? Is everyone this good at leaving him speechless or is it just Steve’s friends? They must find him, like a beacon of light. People that speak with such clarity and purpose.

“How is Steve doing?” her voice low, a touch of concern, “You know him better than any of us ever will.”

You do? You know the scent of his neck in the morning. The way he curls into you. Every one of his clear glass looks. How is he? _He’s living like he can’t live without me. We’re trading touches like breathing, a back-and-forth that never stops._ Guilt washes through his stomach. Steve is always racing toward threats. He will get himself hurt. And are you keeping him safe? Or are you pretending to sleep while he breathes in your hair? _I am holding him close, I can’t let go, and I think we are both going to drown._

Every life is a tragedy if you look at it the right way. 

Stare at the table. You have to say something. So blank eyes and tense shoulders, “He’s doing fine.”

She studies his face. “Good.”

The third door opens and you are not questioned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The lovely yvieinsane is working on bringing Every Door Opens to life in a podfic!! Chapters 1 and 2 are already up! Listen to her stunning work over here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/1857414
> 
> In other news, these chapters keep getting longer!! How long will they be by the end??? Let me tell you friends, I have seen the outlines and they aren't getting any shorter. We are on an accelerating word train! 8D Hope you are enjoying the ride!
> 
> Watch Last Action Hero if you haven’t seen it! If you like meta and you like action movies, you’ll love it. :)


	15. So Throw it Away

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Betrayal is his metal fist slamming into your head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack suggestion!  
> Real by Years & Years  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3T2RnTBp_4
> 
> Head's up: I've added a tag for contemplation of suicide. It's not too far off the suicide-as-sacrifice introduced in canon, but I'm adding a warning just in case! Thanks for reading lovelies! :)
> 
> Many thanks to Doodsxd for the Portuguese dialog translation!! :)

Betrayal is his metal fist slamming into your head. The sounds of panic in the elevator as your body collides with its steel wall. The sick, inky smoke of shock dulling your reflexes. You are never expecting it. There is blood spattered all over your suit. And it is Bucky’s violent eyes, sharp and savage above his mask, that fill your vision. He’s wrenching you up harshly by your suit jacket. Betrayal is too loud, too close, roaring in your face— 

“He’s dead.”

 

* * *

 

Yesterday you were looking for a way out.

“Let’s just ask them.”

“No. You’re a sorry-ass excuse for a spy.”

“This will be different. No cover. Just Captain America asking them to join the team. For real this time.”

“I’m sure you remember what happened last time we recruited Hydra scientists.”

“They deserve a chance. They’re not soldiers. There are only two places for people with their skills. It’s us or them.”

“Why not work for both? Seen that before, too.”

“Damnit, Nick! What we’re doing now isn’t working. If you want them dead then shoot them in their beds. You’ve done worse,” Steve was snarling. Furious, “If I can turn even one of them, we’d have some intel. We could stop throwing good people at dead end missions. At least one of them must want out.”

“Fine, Cap. Whatever you want.” It rang of resignation and they didn’t have time for that.

 

* * *

 

Yesterday you tried to persuade him.

Bucky had hated the idea as well. He said it felt desperate. He rejected every one of Fury’s entry and exit plans. The tension between the two of them simmered and spat. There is no reconciling it; they see the world very differently. One from the ground, where people scream and bleed, and the other from above, where nations and legends are broad strokes on the map. 

Steve and Fury had their differences and Steve could be blunt but Bucky was sharp. His words pierced and cut and Nick returned them blow-for-blow. Even their rare agreements felt like sparring.

“If you’re so concerned about his safety, why don’t you work security?” Nick snapped it like an insult.

“Fine,” and Bucky pushed away from the table. End of discussion.

 

* * *

 

Then the sun rose on today. New day, new chance. You got into an armored van with him and watched him tie on that black cloth mask. Two knots at the base of his neck.

“You don’t have to wear that you know,” Steve had murmured when Bucky had his hands behind his head. Just over an hour ago.

“I know.”

They were alone in the back and the cabin partition was up. Highway hum. Steve in a soft grey suit with freshly polished shoes. Bucky in all black, leather and Kevlar, only his left arm and his quiet eyes exposed. 

Bucky tipped his head back against the paneling, considering Steve across the van.

“You sure you want the Winter Soldier as your bodyguard?” There might have been the soft inflection of humor in his voice but Steve couldn’t tell with the cloth muffling his voice. It didn’t matter; there was only one answer. He only asked to hear Steve say it.

“Yes,” Steve held his eyes, something electric about seeing him behind that mask, “and you don’t have to call yourself that.”

“I know,” Bucky didn’t break his gaze, “but you believe in second chances.”

Steve could see the smirk in the corner of his eyes. Cold blue that warms only for him. Viciousness that flies home on the same plane. Strength that melts into sleep in his arms. Steve smiled back and soaked in the thrill of having him within arm’s reach. 

 

* * *

 

An hour ago you lost your focus.

Black boots on the tile. The quiet rustle of body armor and ballistic fabric. Harsh fluorescent lights and the air was cold and stale. Five floors underground and this was already a mistake.

Steve kept his eyes on the man in front of him.

Watching the shine of his hair as he passed under the ceiling lights. The way he slowed slightly before they passed a doorway. The way his shoulders were drawn back, ready tension. He moved a bit faster than the three agents trailing behind them both. Hurried rustles as they tried to keep up without running.

Watching the crook of his elbow where the butt of his assault rifle rested. Steve could just see a hint of black cloth through his hair, the knots at the back of his mask.

Ferocity on display. Bucky stared down a man in a worn brown suit coming the other way down the hall. The man flushed and blanched at once, blood fleeing and pooling in confusion and fear. He stared at the floor, avoiding Bucky’s eyes. _All for you._ Steve’s mind tried to quiet the thought but it swam up anyway. He is the embodiment of violence and grace and he is proud to bare his teeth for you, protect what’s his. Warmth in your chest. Danger heightened by your civilian clothes, no weapons. No shield but the man in front of you. 

He walked like death itself and nudged Steve’s heart to beat faster. Pulled thoughts to the forefront that didn’t belong here.

Steve’s eyes drifted over the taper of his waist, thinking of the lean lines of his body in the mirror back in Geneva. The jut of his hip above his trousers. The subtle shadows where the muscle cut in and disappeared below cloth. His eyes followed the hem of Bucky's jacket, mostly obscured by knives, and he thought of the faint dimples at the base of his spine. The curve of his back when he’s slouched at the kitchen table or curled on a sleeping bag, waiting for Steve’s embrace.

One image too many and hunger pushed hot under his ribs. Closeness is yearning until you know enough to imagine more. You know the fit of his body around yours, head resting on the breadth of his chest. You know the weight of him sleeping on your shoulder. The strength of his arms when he’s pulling you close, putting himself in front of whatever is flying toward you.

You watch him with careless eyes and let your mind spin fantasies with what you know.

_Remember the way he sat in the van, legs splayed, hands in his lap. The easy grace of his limbs at rest. Reach out and put your hand on his knee. Watch his eyes and trace up the inner trouser seam with your thumb._

_Remember the way his shoulders looked this morning. Loading and checking his guns, laid out meticulously on the table. His back to you and he hadn’t yet put on his jacket. Just soft grey cotton over his skin. Watch his muscles bunch, neck a graceful arc, as brushed metal slides and clicks in his hands. Walk up behind him and slip your arms around his waist. Bury your nose in his hair and curl your fingers around the hem of his shirt, searching for skin._

_Reach out now. Grab his arm and pull back. He’ll spin, eyes wide with surprise. Shove him to the wall, pin him with your weight. Slide hungry hands up the straps over his chest until you reach his collar. He’ll let you, gun still loose in his hand, melting into your touch. Then slowly pull the black cloth down from his nose. You’re close enough to feel his breath on your lips, to see the dark heat in his eyes. Slide your thumb along his jaw, fingers weaving into his hair, and pull him to you. A kiss to promise something more._

Bucky stopped abruptly. Two steps from an intersecting corridor. Listening. He turned his head and the glimpse of his profile was too much. Much too intimate. Lust surged thick in his gut. _Stop._ Get your head on straight. He walks in front so he can take a bullet for you. Focus and respect the danger here.

 

* * *

 

Twenty minutes ago you convinced a frightened man to leave his lab and follow you with some blend of persuasion and intimidation. Three promises: amnesty, a lab, and government protection.

You left as soon as he agreed, though that was just a formality if you’re honest with yourself. The scientist in front, then Bucky, then Steve, then three of Fury’s best men covering from behind.

They take a different route on the way out, using a freight elevator to reach the surface. Surprise and hope in Steve’s throat— _could it be this easy?_

 

* * *

 

Less then five seconds ago, betrayal upended your world again.

All you remember is that raspy voice, “Sorry Steve.” Your head is still swimming from the impact but there is no time for that. Bucky is pulling hard at your jacket.

 _Fuck. Piece it together, Rogers._  

Anger brings clarity. You were standing in the middle of the elevator, watching the man in the lab coat watch his shoes. Bucky and the three agents circling the two of you. Then that rough apology from the man behind you, the kind that only comes before treachery. Instincts remembered the sound of broken trust in an elevator and you were already jerking away, ducking down from the barrel rising to your temple.

Flash of metal. Bucky’s left hand slipped in the gap between the gun and Steve’s head. His fingers wrapped around the muzzle as the gun went off. The deafening crack echoed in this steel box. His palm swallowed the bullet but not the momentum. Metal fist to your head. Head to elevator wall.

Three more cracks as you blinked back the stars. Ears ringing— _not again._

Now you’re kneeling on the floor, blood on your hands that is not your own. Gripping the vest of a fallen agent, three holes where his face used to be. And Bucky is yelling and pulling hard. “He’s dead, Steve,” voice cutting with urgency, “We have to go— _now_.”

Release your grip and leave this body here. We have to go.

 

* * *

 

A blur of movement and harsh voices back to the car. Heat in the parking lot, heat in the car. One agent drives, Steve in the passenger seat, the other agent in the back with Bucky, the scientist between them.

They’re already ten minutes away from his lab. Driving over a long, tall bridge. Nothing but sky and water on the horizon. Blue all around.

Things could be worse. Steve tries to re-anchor the mission. He turns in his seat to tell the pale scientist what will happen next. The man’s eyes are calm but weary. He listens wordlessly.

Bucky’s gaze never leaves the man’s face. His rifle rests between his legs, finger flat across the trigger guard.

Suddenly, Bucky interrupts him, “Where is the base in Argentina?” The tone of his voice is enough to make Steve’s eyes snap, stomach drop.

The scientist turns to him, face uncannily calm.

Bucky prompts him again, “You had a lab there. Give me the address.” The world lurches— _not again._  

The man smiles sadly and looks at his knees. He murmurs, “Clever. But too late.”

Bucky doesn’t hesitate. He drops his gun and swiftly pulls the man from his seat into his arms while twisting toward the door. A flash and one stiff kick with two black boots. The door rips off its hinges, whirling down the highway behind them like a steel leaf. Before the driver can even slow the car, Bucky jumps and the two of them are following its path. Over the railing, out of sight, and into the blue.

Just like that.

Highway wind whipping into the car. They’re gone. Chaos because you never expect it.

Steve’s shouting at the driver, though he’s already slammed on the brakes, and ripping open his own door. He makes it to the railing just in time to see the explosion below. A suicide bomb. Because it is hard to kill Captain America but it is easy to accept his olive branch and die next to him.

He’s gone. Debris in the water, choppy with waves from the blast. Were there two bodies or one? Steve’s mind is still searching for a next step, as if there was still something that could be done.

Did he let go as they dropped? Did he shield himself from the blast? Steve watches the water settle again with desperate eyes.

This is when your heart is tested and it is just as you feared. When you know too quickly, black void in your stomach, that you have lost him. And you look behind your ribs and see there is nothing left. Nothing to give up its rhythm because it is already under the waves. You’ll jump. Your body knows it before your mind.

 _Let it be me—_ It could have been. But it seems you are too naive to see duplicity when it is close to you. Not until it’s on top of you, when it is already too late. He deserved better than this.

Steve grips the railing and steps on the first rung.

You will jump. Because it was you who betrayed him today. He asked you to choose carefully and you led him here anyway. A foolish mission, gambling with persuasion when the stakes were too high.

You promised you wouldn’t let him fall again. Your promise was not enough so follow him down. Chase the waves, hold your breath until you find him. And if he is truly gone, then follow him in death. It won’t be the first time you’ve tried. Because it seems you only win when the world is ending. Only when you throw your life away.

Steve’s leather-soled dress shoes slip on the second rail. He leans forward to pitch toward the sea.

So throw it away.

You loosen your grip, eyes toward the water. You bend you knees to jump and— 

There he is.

Just hanging by four metal fingers. Under the bridge, held up by his grip on the lip of a supporting column. His body sways gently with the wind and his eyes rest easy on the horizon.

He is calm, even when he looks up to the sound of Steve’s wrecked voice, “Bucky!” 

Steve climbs over the railing, crouching and reaching to extend a hand. Bucky takes it and rises to the road again. Steve tugs them both back to safety and immediately pulls him close with shaky hands, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

He holds him tight to his chest, arms over the guns still strapped to Bucky’s back. He forgets the agents standing just a few steps away and holds him, shaking fiercely. One hand pressed between his shoulder blades, one on his head. Bucky hides his face in the nook of Steve’s neck and returns the embrace, arms around his waist.

You have too much to lose. Steve can’t stop mumbling shaky apologies into Bucky’s hair, “I’m so sorry Buck,” voice hushing to a whisper, “I thought I lost you.”

Steve pulls back to see his face. He knows. He looks back at you with steady blue eyes and knows: if he wants to keep you alive, he has to live too.

No more second chances.

 

* * *

 

A plush hotel room with two beds. Evidently, working security means never leaving Steve’s side. 

Steve changes out of his suit while Bucky lays wires around all the windows and vents. He tests the walls and repositions the furniture. Then lays out all his weapons in neat rows on one of the beds to clarify, as if there was any question, that they’ll be sleeping side-by-side.

Sleeping close on missions has become another unacknowledged routine. Bucky returning to Steve’s room or tent at night, some pretense or just to talk. Then staying until it is too late and they’re already sprawled on the thin sleeping bag or propped up on pillows against the headboard, watching some TV movie. And when Steve thinks he’s truly settled, he switches out the light without a word. Reaches for him in the dark, pulls him close, and melts into his back. Never a blanket. Just two warm bodies that rest easier when they are touching.

Steve leans out of the bathroom, “Hey Buck, did you bring a toothbrush?”

“No,” Bucky is checking the ammunition in a handgun, crossed legs on the bed, surrounded by weapons. 

“Oh, do you want to use mine?”

Bucky looks up and hesitates, “No.”

“You sure? It’s fine with me.”

“Yeah,” Bucky returns his attention to the gun, “I don’t— ever bring one.”

A confused pause before Steve asks, “Really? You just leave it at home?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Bucky studies the gun in his hands, “It’s a luxury. Luxuries are for home.”

 _Home._ Steve swallows the swell of warmth, “Use my toothbrush, Buck.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“I know. I want you to anyway.” Bucky’s hands slow. Steve gives no explanation. Show him just a glimpse, test the unspoken questions. _Do you want? Are you ready for? What if we?_

Soft water sounds from the bathroom. Bucky brushes his teeth and washes his face. When he rounds the corner Steve’s laying back against the headboard, bag of black cherries open on the bed.

A little invitation in their language of touches and gifts— _come sit with me._

“Where’d these come from?” Bucky settles on the other side of the bed. Still wearing his black combat trousers, cotton shirt, thick socks. No boots though. That’s new.

“I brought them from home.” Steve offers him a few so their hands can brush.

Watch some action movie Steve will have Bucky retell later. Because the story's imprint in his memory is more interesting than the film. Which details he remembers, which he leaves out. Another chance to see the world through his eyes. Flickering screen until Bucky’s breathing slows. Then shut it off and turn to him.

Bucky’s chin is tucked, head resting on his chest, shoulders slumped against the bed frame. Steve leaves the light on and pulls him over. His head on Steve’s pillow, body diagonal across the bed. Bucky comes, soft and pliable. A heavy sleeper or an excellent actor. 

Your relationship has always been about easy closeness. Too good at living with the questions to ask, enough static between you to distract you both. It was what it was. The future stretched out in front of you and bigger questions loomed. You’d have time to ask later. You didn’t know you’d already made yourselves.

You’re closer to death now. You almost lost him today. And now you know there is no great reckoning. Every unasked question will follow you to the grave. 

Sacrifice clears the lines and now every touch is a perfect telegraph. You know how to take what you want and all you want is each other. Fuck the world and its expectations.

With Bucky on his back, Steve curls around him. Arm around Bucky’s waist, fingers easy over his ribs. Before he can stop himself he’s found a new way to close the gap between them. He lifts a knee and lets the inside of his thigh rest on top of Bucky’s. Knee bent, foot touching his calf. 

Bucky stirs with a soft sigh and Steve freezes. _That was too far._ But he just turns his head on the pillow to face Steve and settles again. And now he is much too close. Breathing the same air. Faces just inches apart on the pillow. One pair of eyes wide with indecision and want, the other pair closed and easy with sleep.

And if they were open, what would they show? Is it your imagination or have his eyes been darkening recently?

 _Do it now, wake him up with your wanting. The air between you is already hot, close the distance and press a kiss to his lips. Wake him up with soft heat and hunger. Slide your leg between his until you are pressed hip to hip. Wake him up with a low sound in his ear and fingers under his shirt._ Your mind is much bolder than your hands.

Steve is the mirror image of the predator in that underground hallway. He readies his claws to protect you and you watch him in his sleep like prey. He is breathing easy now because he trusts you and you’re dreaming of picking him apart. _He sleeps with all his clothes on, two knives in his pockets. Don’t push him._

_What are you thinking? Now now. Words have to come first._

If you breathe out these dreams will he breathe them in?

 

* * *

 

“No,” new word, still foreign here, “I can’t.”

Harsh voice on the line. Angry buzz. He won’t argue but he’ll ask again.

“I’m sorry Nick. Not this time.” 

Steve hangs up and slips his phone back into his pocket. He took the call in the kitchen so Bucky could hear him say it. Their eyes meet and it’s enough. Drop back into the easy flow of life at home.

Bucky is chopping tomatoes. He’s right handed but keeps the knife in his left. Metal for metal, gentle fingertips for delicate red flesh.

Cooking together. Effortless team, no matter the task.

Steve watches the stove, one pot of pasta, another for the sauce, and asks Bucky to measure out herbs and spices. Index finger tracing down the recipe page to find the next ingredient, Steve watches Bucky from the corner of his eye. He measures out two teaspoons of oregano by pouring it into his left palm and dropping it straight into the bowl.

“One ounce of garlic.” Bucky measures with his palm again.

“And a half a teaspoon of salt in a new bowl.” Bucky pulls a new bowl from the cabinet, pours salt steadily into hand, and drops it into the dish.

Steve asks him to find the citrus juicer and when he ducks to search the lower cabinets, he tips the salt into the unused measuring spoon on the counter. Exactly half a teaspoon.

For every dark secret there is a bright surprise. He has no idea how beautiful he is. 

 

* * *

 

“Bucky, just think about it.” Steve’s hands buried in soapy water. Washing dishes by hand because the dishwasher has been leaking on the kitchen floor.

“There’s nothing to think about.” Steve washes and Bucky dries.

“You’re a better leader than you think. The Howling Commandos were your team, not mine. They followed me because you followed me.”

“I don’t remember that.”

“You just led a mission, Buck. You planned the route, responded to threats.”

“Yeah, that went really well.”

“Considering that two of the six people involved were set on killing us all, it couldn’t have gone much better.”

“We didn’t have enough information to just walk up to the target. And those agents might have been good shots but they were wrong for the job.”

“So pick them. You choose who we work with.”

“That’s not what I do.”

“But you’re better at it. Than any of us,” Steve picks at a stubborn crust with his fingernail, “You’re a better judge of character.”

How can you really tell him— _You are suspicious and that is a strength. You’re more level-headed. And you are ruthless. You know when to kill one of your own to save the rest._

“You led men before— all this,” Steve gestures in the air between them. _Before these bodies. Before we could move faster than we could think._ “You know what it feels like— to lead as one of them. To be just another soldier with a gun.” 

Bucky has been holding the same dry plate, sliding a dish rag over flawless porcelain. He watches his hands and says nothing.

“I’ll pick the missions if you run them. Your plan, your team,” Steve swirls dishwater in a cup and sets it aside.

Bucky stands the plate in the dish rack and takes the next from Steve’s hands, “Alright.”

 

* * *

 

After dinner. Socked feet propped up on kitchen chairs.

He’s turned it down but his mind can’t leave it, “Do you think they’ll be okay?”

“Yes. They’ve done this dozens of times now. Just a technology extraction,” Bucky lifts his mug to his lips. Peppermint tea and patience tonight. 

Abandoned base. Drop in, blow it up, get out. He’s right, they’ll be fine.

“You know Nick mentioned they found a— chair. At the last one.” This wasn’t something he meant to bring up. Just one of those worried thoughts that circles until it slips.

Bucky’s face is unchanged.

“They haven’t—,” _this is getting worse_ , “They haven’t given up. On finding you.” _What are you doing? What do you expect him to say?_

Bucky says nothing, just watches Steve’s eyes.

“Sometimes I think— maybe we should just disappear,” he laughs but it's not a joke, “Just move to Brazil and live off the grid.”

“Okay,” Bucky’s not laughing. Not even smiling. Even face, steady eyes.

“Wouldn’t you miss this place?” But what does he have here? No family, no ties, no country. Not anymore.

“No,” Bucky cocks his head, “Lar é qualquer lugar onde estou com você.” A crooked, warm smile on his lips.

The doorbell rings and they both jump again. Every visitor an unexpected intrusion.

Steve walks straight to the door and Bucky follows him as far as the hall. He prefers to listen, just out of sight.

Steve opens the door to Natasha and a beautiful, blushing woman with raven hair whom he has never seen before.

“Hey,” Natasha speaks before the door has completed its opening arc, “Fury told me you two were playing hooky. Thought you could use a night out.” She gives him a playful smile and the woman with the dark hair lets slip a breathy giggle.

“This is Emily. She’s new to D.C. too.” Steve shakes her hand and from the hopeful smile in her eyes he knows exactly where this is going. Stomach plummeting through the floor as he says, “Nice to meet you. Could you excuse me a minute?”

Three steps back to the corner Bucky waits behind but he’s already moved back. Their eyes meet as he’s stepping backward toward the kitchen, away from Steve and the invitation and the veneer of normality. _Go_ , he mouths at Steve. Still in earshot of the door so Steve just shakes his head. _Go_ , he mouths again, eyebrows knitting. 

Steve steps forward as Bucky sidesteps into the kitchen. Abandoning the women in the doorway because even an innocent invitation is too great a threat to this fragile closeness with no name. He needs to know there’s nowhere Steve would rather be. That he wants to spend the night watching terrible movies and sitting on the couch and trying to get Bucky to say something in Portuguese again, because he _wants to._

_He should know by now but he doesn’t. Tell him as many times as it takes._

But when Steve rounds the corner the kitchen is empty; he’s already vanished. 

Steve stays home. Begs off at the door. Apology in his voice but nothing like the apology in Natasha’s eyes. This won’t happen again.

He sits in the kitchen until 2 am and Bucky still hasn't come back.

Run and follow, run and follow. No conversations in the open. Let truth slip when you are curled close, intoxicated by touches. When you’d say anything to get closer. When you’re afraid of losing him. 

Or when you are brave enough to confront it. When you see shame flicker in his eyes and he doesn’t deserve that.

 

* * *

 

Steve lays in his bed on top of the covers. Memories fade to dreams.

_They were in France. Closer to the front lines than usual. And as they wound toward the Hydra base they kept ears open for nearby mortars._

_Taking cover in an abandoned house during an airstrike, crouching by windows to watch the planes above, estimate their path. It was Steve that slipped and grabbed the windowsill, clean cut deep into his finger from the shattered glass._

_It would heal within the hour but that didn’t stop Bucky from giving him an exasperated look and pulling him close by the wrist. He unscrewed the cap of his canteen for water to clean the wound, but found it empty. Without a second thought, he brought Steve’s hand to his mouth and cleaned it there, soft lips, hot tongue._

_Then Bucky dropped his hand and met his eyes, nothing but dark heat between them. There is so much stillness in war, but never enough for the two of you._

_Then memory drops away and dream claims its place. Here, on the drowsy stage where your mind plays out its greatest stories, you are both still. The director stifles the call from Morita to draw you out, back to the road, back to the march toward the base._

_You watch each other until Bucky speaks, “You can die. Can’t you?”_

_“I think so.”_

_“But you’ve tried how many times now? Jumped, drowned, sunk.” Bucky leans against the filthy wall, “I shot you full of holes and you’re still here. I’m beginning to wonder what it would take.”_

_“No, I’m sure I can die. The serum made me stronger, not immortal. I’m just lucky.”_

_“I’m not talking about the serum.”_

_Steve blinks._

_“How many times can you get lucky before you will always get lucky? You’re flipping a coin and it always comes up heads. I don’t think you can lose.”_

_“It’s an illusion. As soon as it comes up tails, there are no more coin flips.”_

_“Then why do you keep flipping it?”_

_Steve watches his eyes and realizes they are the eyes of Bucky now, not Bucky then, “Why do you?”_

_Bucky ignores the question and continues as if Steve hadn’t spoken, “Even if you wanted to follow me in death, I’m not sure you could. Life’s not what we thought it was. You don’t grow old until you die. We don’t hold our fate in our hands.”_

_“We haven’t had a chance to grow old yet,” Steve steps closer. Catch the fear in his eyes and pull it out. Or aren’t you strong enough?_

_“Do you expect to die every time you jump?”_

_Steve considers, a question to define you. Are you human? “Yes.”_

_“And yet it never comes. Death doesn’t want you.” Bucky tips his head back against the wall. Your conscience, your inner voice, “I will die before you and you know it.”_

_“No Buck,” gripping his arms with conviction but he doesn’t respond. Just leaning against the wall, watching you say, “I won’t let that happen.”_

_“Then stop flipping the coin. Maybe you are immortal, but I will die one day.”_

_Steve can’t breathe through the pain in his chest._

_“I can feel it under my skin, Steve.”_

 

* * *

 

Bucky is back in his room when Steve wakes. He pads down to the kitchen and makes oatmeal. _We’re going to talk about it._ Easy as that. Just decide. Out in the daylight.

Bucky walks into the kitchen and takes out two mugs for tea.

“I didn’t go.”

“I know.” It’s stiff. Bucky’s voice grim.

Spit it out. Be clear. Tell him how you feel before you lose him again. Steve stops stirring. “There’s nowhere I’d rather be,” Bucky stills at the words, “than here. With you.”

Soft pop of the oatmeal bubbling in the pot. Whisper of chilled air through the house. Bucky’s breathing has slowed and he is waiting for your words. He will let you shape this, whatever it is between you two, if you want to. But you want him to do it with you. So give him silence to voice his fears.

“Don’t you want more than this?” Bucky’s voice almost too low to be heard. Steve watches his face in profile. Sad lines around his eyes.

“Yes,” Steve’s heart jumps into a tangle in his chest. He asks for reassurance so give it to him. Whisper every sweet affirmation you’ve dreamed into your shared pillow. Pull him in and spill your fantasies in the heat between your lips and his. Leave no doubt, “I do.” The want in Steve’s voice is obvious. Now tell him what—

“Then you should have gone,” Bucky looks up. Black vacancy in his eyes. 

“I don’t want— someone else. We can—”

“We can,” he holds Steve’s eyes to tell him something too painful for words alone, “But it’s better if we don’t.” Words land like he’s burying them. Shutter the windows to hide from the sun. Now shovel in the dirt and leave it there.

Steve is breathless with hurt. These words never would have left his lips if you hadn’t reached for him. He wouldn’t have bit your hand if you hadn’t extended it.

Words are a reflex to gasp away rejection, “Don’t say that Buck. Give it time,” Swallow your proclamations— _And even if there is nothing more, I still want to be here. If this is all there is, then it is enough,_ “Maybe you’re just not ready. Not yet.” Bleed your heartache on your shoes and watch the stove.

“Yeah,” Bucky drops his eyes. _Will the sun rise even if you believe the night will never end? And if it does will you believe your eyes?_ No room for hope when you are already resigned to a fate you can’t control, “Not ready.”

Then let him bite you. Grip his arms when he would rather fall, deadweight to nothingness. Hold him above the void until you are numb. And when he asks why you don’t let go, tell him the dawn will bring the answer. He will know why in the morning.

“Bucky,” Steve drops the wooden spoon in the pot and walks over to him. He rests a soft hand between his shoulder blades and says, “You’re perfect the way you are. I hope you don’t feel— ashamed. Of anything. You’re enough, right now.” Steve runs his hand down Bucky’s spine. A caress even if he doesn’t think his skin is soft enough to shiver, “You’re not missing any pieces.”

“I’m not ashamed,” Bucky's voice betrays an uncertainty he is too good at hiding, “Shame is for people who could have made a different choice.”

 


	16. Open Arms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is hell: waking up to Steve calling your name.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first half of this chapter has no suggested soundtrack. The song for the second half is:
> 
> Warm Water by Banks (Snakehips Remix)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjzzgssrhVQ
> 
> There will be a link in the text to cue you when to start the song if you're listening along! ^.^ Enjoy!

Bucky wakes up and knows immediately, before his eyes have opened, that he has failed. They are both dead. And this is hell.

He opens his dead eyes to Steve screaming, frantic face, “Bucky? Bucky! Buck—”

An explosion behind him drowns the sound. Nauseating heat washes over them both and forces Bucky’s eyes closed again. 

This is hell: waking up to Steve calling your name. You failed him. _What have you done?_ Your mission incomplete. _What threat was stronger than you?_ Hell is feeling his hands sliding under your shoulders and knees. Lifting your deadweight and panting, muttering nothing words to calm you and still his pounding heart. Hell is letting your head drop back, blank open eyes. Hell is your head loose on your neck and your mind a blank. You should fight till you die— _but you’re already dead._

Bucky’s body is jostling in Steve’s arms. He’s running— _but Steve, there’s nowhere to go. You can’t get out of hell once you’ve fallen in._ Shouting into the mic hooked in his ear— _Steve, there is no one to hear you now._ Everything is on fire _—so this must be hell._

You see pain walking up from a long way away. Trench coat and hat pulled low. You simply wait for it to arrive, curl your head against Steve’s chest, squeeze shut your eyes. You wait while it reaches in its jacket folds, draws a gun, levels the black barrel at your temple. You can feel the cold press of metal on your skin before the impact. 

A bullet through your brain; pain rips your mind apart.

The pain is so intense that Bucky cannot comprehend it. His body rejects it. Every muscle in his body flexes against it, his face contorts, every ounce of will focused on shutting it down, containing it, shoving it back. But the pain is much too strong. It explodes in his chest, ripping him to shreds through his ribs. It flares, horrible and fire-bright, in his mind and wrenches open his clenched jaw. A scream to wake the dead. Bucky’s lungs convulse and he is screaming with everything he has, a roar to push back the crushing wall.

Steve is running even faster now. He trips and the sudden dip as he staggers to keep his balance ignites something in Bucky. _Wake up._ Anger rips through him, black and vicious. _He needs you._ He grits his teeth and snarls at the pain. Bucky’s mind fights for space to think. He curls his head toward his chest and wills himself to shut it down.

Just enough static between the flames to think— _you’re not dead._ Deep breath, brace your abdomen against the shake— _stay with me._ Tense your legs and draw your shoulders in—“you’re gonna be okay.” Not thoughts after all; that’s Steve’s voice in his ear. Thinking for him. Telling him all he needs to know. Bucky opens his eyes to find him but his vision is shot. A blurry screen of light and shadow. 

Nothing but pain, glass shards wrapped around his head. Bucky grips a strap over Steve’s chest to anchor himself. The pain is stronger than he is. This is the only fight he can face right now and he’s losing. The pain is consuming him and Bucky is shrinking away from it. Getting tenser and stiller, willing it to retreat. He’s cornered and out of options.

Suddenly, Steve stops. He shifts so he’s holding Bucky with one arm and uses the other to draw a pistol from Bucky’s hip. He cocks it one handed and says, voice like steel, “Move.” 

The menace in his voice is obvious and Bucky’s blurry eyes shoot open to find the threat— _as if there is anything you can do_. The shaky outline of a single guard laying down his weapon. Steve didn’t even have to raise the gun. Black anger, bile in your throat— _stay with me._

Steve takes off again in a sprint. Bucky feels the lurch of danger in his stomach, just a whisper of emotion under the vise of pain. Doesn’t know where they are or where they’re going. But Steve says he’s alive— _so hold on._

His nerves are past their limit. They’re sparking and twisting, crying out for release. Bucky is whimpering now. Horrible, pleading sounds he has no energy left to suppress. Steve’s telling him something but he can’t understand the words. He just shakes his head and thinks—  _Steve, I can’t—_

Gunshots ring out, recoil of a gun too close to Bucky’s head. The deafening sound makes his exhausted body jerk and spasm. 

Even with pain cracking up his thoughts into dust, Bucky knows something is wrong. Steve’s moving with another man’s motions. No verbal warnings, no shield, no defense. He’s moving forward on a set path and firing. Precise shots, one at a time. Killing men before they can fire a shot. Anger roars in Bucky’s ears, demands he shake himself to life again. _Fuck—it’s for you—it’s for you so don’t you fucking dare—you have to—hold on._

Anger rents what’s left of his spent frame and claws his eyes open. His left arm. _My left_ —the pain shrieks above his thoughts— _where is my hand?_ A mess of wires and sparks where his fingers should be.

There is no blood. _Where is the blood?_ His addled mind sees veins where there are only wires. There should be blood because this must be pain before death. Nothing could hurt more than this. But of course not. _This isn’t even pain._ It’s something too dark for a name. Pain is useful. A signal from your body to your mind. Crying out, a shout for help, begging you to retreat, to move, to stop. And this isn’t a signal. This agony has no purpose but to break you. 

Pain laughs at you— _how many times will you lose it? How many limbs do you have to give?_

Bucky laughs back, a harrowing sound, and feels Steve’s arms grip him a bit tighter. He draws two more breaths, chest so heavy and tight, and passes out.

 

* * *

 

“—on our way.”

There’s snow all around. He’s so cold.

“No he’s not responsive.”

 _No—no—no._ Where is your arm?

“Yes, federal med-evac. Two hours, twenty minutes.”

That’s right, that’s right. There’s the pain again. Bucky can’t even scream. He just lets it wash over him, acid under his skin. He opens his eyes to find Steve before the pain takes his sight again.

“Is there anything I can do now?”

Steve’s face is inches above his own. His eyes clouded but sharp. They jump wider when he sees Bucky’s eyes open.

“I can try. Hold on—hold on. Bucky? Buck? He’s awake. Buck?” Steve shakes him gently, “Yeah—I’ll put you on speakerphone.”

Bucky’s eyes drink in the smooth curve of his skin over his cheekbones. The deep worried line between his eyes. The shadow where his lips part. Then he submits to the pain and slips under it again. His body heaves and he turns his head to vomit on the floor.

Steve pulls him up from where he was laid out on the floor, drags Bucky’s rebelling body into his lap. Wraps tight arms around his waist and chest and holds him close. Keeps him upright now that Bucky’s spine has given up trying. “Hey, there you go. It’s okay. You’re okay.” Steve’s lips are pressed to Bucky’s ear. Soft skin on skin, soft heat in his ear when Steve whispers, “I’ve got you. Just hold on. We’re almost there. Just stay with me.”

His words are so gentle but it’s anger that bubbles up Bucky’s throat. _Why is there so much pain? Why doesn’t death follow?_ Just lay down, lay down and let go.

Bucky stops trying to breathe. His heart slows. Sweet release. But Steve’s voice again, “Come on Buck, come on. Stay with me,” voice pitching and cracking. He is shaking fiercely around Bucky’s body. Claw your way back to the surface. Rip your fingernails off to keep yourself afloat. _He is here. He is alive._ So fight it. If he is alive then you can live. Flash your claws and sink your teeth.

Bucky retches again. Spattering blood and vomit on their boots. Steve is crying. Bucky can feel him gasping for air, feel the wetness on his neck, feel his sobs wracking against his back.

“Yeah, I’m still here,” a broken reply to the tinny sounds coming from the phone.

Bucky’s jacket has been unbuckled and he guides a trembling hand to his chest to feel his heart beat. _Keep beating._ Anger threatens the man that crumples under pain’s unrelenting pressure. Another force stronger than he is.

Bucky’s hand falls away, bracing against his knee, fighting for strength, and Steve’s hand replaces it. He rubs circles into Bucky’s sternum and talks into the phone.

“Is there anything else I can give him?” Steve’s voice is tipped with desperation.

Bucky closes his eyes. Tries to narrow his body to the pressure on his chest. Belatedly, Bucky realizes they’re in a plane, then pain blanks his mind.

“No, I’ve already given him all the dilaudid on board.”

Bucky tries to tie the rhythm of his breathing to Steve’s, so he doesn’t have to heave each breath into his lungs.

“I think that’s what woke him up. Yeah— Yeah, he’s throwing up.”

Bucky collapses into Steve’s chest completely, limbs hanging loose. Or what’s left of them.

“Okay. Okay I will. Thank you, Tony.”

Steve swipes his fingers over the phone and returns them to Bucky’s hair. He draws clean lines over Bucky’s scalp. Bucky clings to the sensation, just straight lines, a little order for the distortion that warps his mind. Bucky follows the strokes, breathes into the hand pressed flat to his chest, and blacks out.

 

* * *

 

He wakes to seven faces in a halo. Bucky blinks and waits for pain, his new reality. Find Steve’s face just before it arrives, slamming through his broken body. There’s a needle in his arm, but it feels no different than the needles that are already there. The needles where his veins used to be. Pain has made it’s own cracks and it seeps in deep. Bucky holds Steve’s eyes until pain takes them away again.

Bucky’s neck lets go and he’s losing his grip. Anger gnashing its teeth but it can’t compel his body to fight. Can’t rip his mind to the present again. Bucky watches Steve’s eyes so they can be the last thing he sees.

Suddenly, the pain lays down. The tempest instantly calms to a flat ocean of hurt. Still much stronger than him, but if he doesn’t fight it, he can float. Bucky moans in ecstasy. Just to feel the pressure in his mind abate. 

Steve’s voice in his ear again, questions, words with no meaning.

And if he lays perfectly still, it’s like the pain can’t find him.

_It’s okay, Steve. I’m okay. Just let me sleep. I’ll still be here— when you—_

 

* * *

 

“I don’t know! I told you, it looked just like a normal grenade,” Steve’s voice is sharp.

“Of course it did, Cap. That’s how they got him to pick it up! He wouldn’t just close his fist around a scary glowing orb of electrical hell.”

“…They made it for him.”

“Yes. Unless there’s someone else on your team with a cybernetic arm hardwired to their nervous system.”

“What did it do to him?”

The man with the unfamiliar voice hums, “Hard to tell. If they built this thing the way I imagine they did, then it basically electrocuted him from the inside.”

Steve says nothing.

“Honestly, the arm is a lot stronger than his body. It’s hard to believe he’s still alive, and even harder to believe he’s still in there.”

“What does that mean?”

“Dunno Cap. I guess we’ll see when he wakes up.”

Bucky feels hollow. There is too much space inside. He lets his head fall to one side. There’s a rustle and he opens his eyes to Steve leaning close.

His clear blue eyes search Bucky’s and he breathes out a soft, “[hey](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjzzgssrhVQ),” fingertips grazing Bucky’s cheek.

Bucky waits for the pain. He draws a breath while his lungs still rest easy and holds it in. He waits. And waits. But it doesn’t come.

Bucky breathes out. Gravelly voice, sandpaper in his throat, he replies, “hey.”

Steve smiles. He looks like he’s going to kiss you.

And you’d let him. This body has known enough pain. Why not chase blind pleasure? _Because_ —remember who you are. Fog of restraint settles over the perfect clarity waiting on his lips. _Because you have someone to protect._

Bucky strains to lift his head and cranes his neck to scan Steve’s body. _Has he found some way to take the pain from your body and hide it in his?_ He lets the effort drop, soft thud as his head falls. Bucky whispers, “Are you okay?”

“Yes.”

“What about the mission?” Bucky voice too quiet to reach beyond Steve’s ears.

Steve shakes his head, “Everyone did what they needed to do.”

Bucky sees his promise mirrored back to him. _I will do whatever I have to do_ —firm hands on his face, soft eyes, shining with relief— _to keep you alive—_ the pull of two bodies that know no life but the call of the other— _because I need you._

It’s selfish. To care for another so deeply that you would die for them; leave them to grieve alone and take your broken heart to the grave. You spat in death’s face. Tore yourself apart to survive the pain. Because he needs you. Because hell is leaving him alone.

You can’t undo what you’ve already done, so keep your promises.

Bucky turns away from Steve’s face to look down at his arm. Nothing but a void. Just a metal ring at his shoulder and a web of wires that disappear toward the floor.

“We’re building you a new one,” Steve is so close, murmuring in his hair, stroking his forearm.

“Steve,” Bucky is suddenly violently dizzy. He closes his eyes and rolls his head. Steve leans in to hear him and Bucky can feel his breath falling soft on his face, “I need to— sleep.”

“Okay, that’s good. Go to—

 

* * *

 

Bucky wakes again to sunshine on his face. Something so calming about its heat. Some hardwired sign of better things to come that lifts the spirit and stills the mind. 

Bucky’s mind remembers he has a body. He feels out its shape, a bit more solid now. He’s leaning back on some cushions. Two breaths to enjoy the warmth on his eyelids before he squints into the light.

There’s a man at his side, “Any special requests?” 

Bucky blinks, the world still hazy and too bright.

“For your arm? Lasers? Missles? Knives? You seem like you have enough of those already. Maybe a night light?”

Bucky furrows his brow and swirls the words around his mind. Then Steve’s voice drifts over the back of the couch, “Is he up?”

“His eyes are open but I don’t think he remembers how to talk.”

Bucky scowls and closes his eyes again. Sinks back into the couch. He hears Steve’s footsteps quickly approaching, then his hand on Bucky’s hair, “Hey Buck.”

Bucky looks up and smiles up at him. The man next to him says nothing.

“This is Tony. He’s working on your new arm.”

“Uh, _excuse me_ , pretty sure you mean he’s engineering it from the ground up. For free. When he could be curing cancer.”

Steve continues as if Tony hadn’t spoken, “We need to connect it to your nervous system while you’re awake. So you can tell us if it’s working. Whenever you’re ready—”

Tony sighs, “It’s not even close to that simple, Steve,” he turns to Bucky, “Your old arm was just an arm-shaped weapon. I’m building you an actual arm. You’ve already got the hardware embedded in your spinal cord, so—” he shrugs and turns back to the wires and metal plates at Bucky’s side, “we need you awake to tell us if your brain recognizes it as an arm.”

Bucky watches his careful hands click tiny metal plates together and says nothing. 

“How do you feel?” Steve has walked around the edge of the couch and is leaning down to sit on the edge. He meets Bucky’s eyes and leans into him, pressing his bent knees into the couch back. 

“I’m okay,” Bucky can feel Tony’s eyes on them, but he’s too tired to care. He tips his head back and falls asleep to the rhythm of Steve’s breathing against his legs.

 

* * *

 

Bucky wakes up to Steve’s hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently. He opens his eyes immediately, the staticky aftermath of pain is already fading from his body. Isn’t that proof enough? He wakes up and wakes up.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“If you’re ready, we need you to sit up for the next part.”

“Okay,” Bucky starts to prepare his muscles to move. Feels them out for a lurking blistery ache.

“Something about circulation. Tony needs your head above your heart.”

“Okay,” Bucky pulls himself to sitting and is surprised at how easy it is. Steve moves to his left side to gather the heap of electronics dangling from his shoulder. He holds it gingerly as they shuffle over to a wooden table a few feet away. Bucky feels absurdly off-balance and strains to not list to one side.

Bucky slouches into one of the chairs and Steve takes the one next to him. They’re in a spacious apartment, glass and steel everywhere. Polished wood floor. And windows that stretch the length of the wall. Outside them, a skyline that feels familiar. 

Tony comes rustling into the room with an armful of metal. He dumps the load on the table and pulls up a chair opposite Bucky. 

He says nothing and immediately begins connecting the wires hanging from Bucky's shoulder. Three wires in and Bucky winces at an electric shock.

“Sorry,” Tony mutters. Steve’s hand flies to Bucky’s knee. Their eyes meet and Steve gives him an encouraging smile. Steve squeezes his knee under the table, fingers curling around the joint, and his hand stays.

Bucky watches Tony work and Steve traces up a couple inches of his trouser seam, then down the other side. It’s comforting and intimate but clearly it’s more than that. Bucky’s heart picks up its pace. 

Tony occasionally calls out commands, “Lift your ring finger—Make a fist—Now punch through the table—hey!— stop! I’m kidding!—Jesus you’re worse than Steve.”

Tony disconnects and reconnects each of the arms a couple of times. He talks to the air and a computer voice responds to record data and read out diagnostics. Steve cajoles Bucky into walking him through the plot of Die Hard. And then Die Hard 2 and 3 and 4 while they’re at it. They haven’t made it to the fifth one yet so Steve speculates on what the plot might be and Bucky smiles.

When Tony finally settles on a model and clears the others away, some three hours later, Steve’s hand is still on Bucky’s knee. 

“Okay, time to plug ‘er in,” Tony stands and wanders off in search of something. In the pause Bucky’s eyes flick to Steve’s face. Soft heat. Steve slides his hand a bit higher and tucks his fingers just underneath Bucky’s thigh. Less of a touch and more of a grip. Like he’s thinking about pulling Bucky closer. Bucky’s heart knocks against his ribs and want swirls.

Tony returns with, “So, this is awkward, but I need to you hold your arm in the air when I make the nerve connection,” Tony demonstrates with his arm straight out in front of his chest, “I have no idea how strong the signal is going to be and even the stimulus of resting it on the table could be too much.”

Bucky tries to lift the arm and finds it comes easily, instantly, “It’s lighter.”

“Yeah it is. A lot lighter. You shouldn’t be able to tell though. I’ll fix that. Hydra’s balancing algorithm was pitiful. But I guess your brain got used to it.”

Bucky nods.

“Alright—” Tony settles into his chair, “Just yell real loud if it hurts.” 

“Tony,” Steve’s voice stern.

“Yeah, yeah mom. Here we go,” and he uses a long thin rod to flick a switch tucked inside Bucky’s elbow. Steve and Tony watch him expectantly. Bucky stares at the arm but feels nothing.

He looks up at Steve. A quiet pause and Steve raises the hand that isn’t tucked around Bucky’s leg. He lowers his index finger over the metal plates of his forearm until it rests just above, then swipes a whisper touch over the surface.

Bucky gasps. 

Startled eyes all around, Tony jumping to scan the diagnostic feed on a nearby tablet, but Bucky says, “Do it again.”

Steve brushes two fingertips this time and Bucky can’t control himself. Every nerve on fire, rippling intoxicating feeling back to his brain. His body shakes and his neck can’t steady his head. A soft moan and his eyes roll back. He finds Steve’s eyes just before he brings his palm to rest on Bucky’s arm. Bucky huffs and gasps at the unbelievable sensation. 

“Well that got weird in a hurry,” Tony deadpans. 

They ignore him. Steve keeps touching, light finger tips swipe from his elbow to his wrist, then fingernails draw circles in his palm. Obviously chasing the sounds, the way his touch makes Bucky’s body melt. Bucky fights for control, near-orgasmic pleasure washing through his body, urging his lungs to contract, his heart to race. His vision is hazy but he can see Steve flush.

“…oh—kay. I’m gonna turn down the sensitivity,” Tony’s voice distant.

“No,” spoken together, Steve assertive, Bucky breathless.

Tony squints at them and stands, “Whatever.” He walks over to a workstation with screens made of nothing but light, “Weird old men.”

“What does it feel like?” Steve’s slightly unsteady voice.

Bucky just shakes his head, panting softly. He’s losing it, way too worked up. Can’t think straight, feeling unhinged. Want has its hands around his throat and Steve’s fingers on his wrist are coaxing him to just give in.

“The new arm has three times the number of nerve endings in his right arm,” Tony flicks numbers and images across the screens, “I figured Hydra might have dulled his senses at the brain stem and didn’t want the signal to be too weak. But, uh— that doesn’t seem to be a problem.”

“You know how to build nerve networks?”

“Yeah I just googled ‘how do nerves work’ and went from there,” Tony never laughs.

Bucky would tell Steve himself if he could. _It feels like I’ve been blind. I can feel the air moving through the room, the subtle currents of heat and cold. I can feel your hand like a magnet, drawing everything inside to the surface. I can feel your heartbeat in your fingertips._ But he just watches Steve’s face and drowns in his touch. _The pain was worth it for this._

“He’ll get used to it,” Tony hums, “Probably a little overloaded right now.” He hides a smirk with a studious frown at his tablet.

“Is it okay for him to put it on the table?” Steve asks. Bucky hadn’t realized he was still holding it up. Tony grunts and Steve pushes lightly on his forearm to encourage Bucky to set it down.

The table feels like a forest in miniature, its wood grain made up of rows and rows of pines, its lacquer like an ocean of silk submerging that tiny world. Bucky runs his new fingers over it and shudders.

“Okay, ready for the owner’s manual?” Tony’s voice from behind the screens.

Bucky looks up at Steve, who is watching him with glistening eyes and a crooked smile. Bucky laughs and Steve laughs too. From devastation to elation. From begging for death to new eyes, new skin, new life.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Tony sits down at the table again, “First of all, you open it like this.” Tony runs his index finger down Bucky’s upper arm and the plates fold out and over themselves to reveal the delicate wires and chips inside, “It’ll only open for you or me—”

“Add Steve,” Bucky’s swallows the waves of pleasure to focus.

“Okay, JARVIS?”

The computer voice responds, “Already done, sir.”

Bucky’s mind is still recovering from its sensory haze. His eyes narrow, “You can access it remotely.” It’s not a question. He says it to watch Tony’s face.

“Yes.”

“Take out the transmitter.”

“No.”

Bucky stares and Tony stares back.

“Look, if something happens you’re going to wish I had a way to fix it long distance.”

“No. Take it out.”

“No,” Tony’s brow furrows incredulously, “It’s my tech, I’m responsible for it.”

“It’s my arm.”

“Yeah— _you’re welcome._ ”

Bucky’s hand twitches with frustration— _settle this with a hand around his throat._ But you’ll never be human if you can’t explain, “Thank you. For building it. But it’s my body now,” Bucky lets his voice settle, “I haven’t— owned my body for a long time.” He lets the anger drain, swallow your pride and see if you can use words to express, “I want to take my chances. Like everyone else.”

Tony holds his eyes for a moment. He says nothing but pulls a blinking blue chip from the crevasse of his bicep.

“Take out the tracker, too.”

Tony sighs deeply and pulls another two staple-shaped chips from deep in his shoulder and wrist, “Are you done? Unbuilding my perfectly engineered arm?” Bucky is fairly sure he can pick up a touch of humor in Tony’s voice.

“Is it susceptible to the same attack?”

“No. There’s a one-way flow gate. It’ll shut off before it sends a signal that strong back to the brain.”

“Is it bulletproof?”

Tony scoffs, “Of course, who do you think I am?”

“I don’t know who you are,” Bucky says simply. _Steve trusts you. That’s enough for now._

“Yeah clearly. Let’s do lunch next time you guys are in the neighborhood,” He nods at Steve and Bucky knows this will never happen.

“Well gentlemen, wish I could stick around and play doctor all day,” Tony stands, “Stay as long as you like,” he disappears out the door without a look back, “until JARVIS tells you to leave,” his echoey voice from the hall.

Silence settles and Bucky’s eyes linger on the open doorway. He waits a moment longer to be sure Tony is gone before turning to Steve.

He’s slouched against the back of his chair, smiling at Bucky. Patient and pliable. 

Steve slips his hand over Bucky’s wrist again, no real excuse but to watch the pleasure flicker over Bucky’s features. His mind is already adjusting to the strength of the signal.

“Thank you,” Bucky voice is steady if a bit soft.

“Of course,” Steve’s voice is softer. He’s been running his thumb across Bucky’s knuckles. Now he lifts Bucky’s hand, draws it close to his face. He holds Bucky’s eyes and lets his lips brush the metal skin.

Bucky tries to stifle the rush but his lips part with a huff. Want, emboldened by touches softer than Bucky was meant to feel, ties his tongue and tips his head back. _Pull him from his chair and push him to the couch. Kiss him because he wants you to. And learn every inch of his skin with this new sense, until you’re tangled and buzzing. Until you’re slurring and pulling at his clothes. You’re already halfway there._

 _Tell him_ , want whispers, _tell him how you want him._

“Want to go for a walk?”

 

* * *

 

It takes nearly an hour to circle the block. Bucky stops to touch everything, cataloguing each texture, trying with halting words to tell Steve what they feel like. 

Flower petals are like a sheet of water with the thinest skin holding it in place. Concrete like a desert of shards, each with a slightly different shape, mired in place. Water is— _incredible._ Like water, but more. Like it’s inside you? Like it’s whooshing around your bones, through your tendons, but with more space, infinite space, like it’s wind whipping through your hair. 

Bucky’s fingers drift back to what they’d really like to explore. He takes the hem of Steve’s shirt between his fingers. Brushes his hand over the muscles of Steve’s shoulder to get his attention. Tentative fingers touch his own hair, and then Steve’s. Bucky’s hand lingers and Steve tips into the touch. The heat from his scalp, remember that too. 

Steve watches him explore and smiles when their eyes meet. Bucky crouches and rests his metal hand on the ground, encouraging an ant to climb on. The tiny insect hardly hesitates before crawling over the pad of his index finger. Bucky can feel its tiny feet skimming across the surface. Steve leans in to watch the ant wind around to his palm and Bucky can feel Steve’s breath cascading down his upper arm. Now even closeness is touching.

Steve turns to face him, as if he knows what sensation Bucky is chasing now. Faces so close that Bucky can watch Steve’s gaze search his eyes, then skitter over his eyelashes, his nose, his lips, before dropping to the sidewalk again.

He is reaching for you and he wants you to jump. Open arms; he’ll catch you. But you’re frozen.

Worry so deep it is voiceless. Even when every excuse has been dismissed. You simply watch him watch you and think— _I can’t._ The fourth door opens and Steve is just waiting for you. You wanted out so badly, but you can’t— _Not ready. Not ready._ Not now doesn’t mean never. If you can’t jump then just wait.

 

* * *

 

Bucky wakes up on the couch. He drags a groggy hand over his face. Must have fallen asleep here last night. They’ve been home for nearly a week now and Bucky has slept through most of it. 

He lays still and listens to Steve and Sam’s hushed voices through the kitchen doorway.

“His body’s probably still healing.”

“Yeah, I know— I just worry he wouldn’t tell me if something was wrong.”

“Nah, he’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

Someone shifts a little in their seat.

“What’d you guys watch last night?”

“Oh, uh— Rambo? I think.”

“Good movie.”

“Yeah.”

“You know I saw this movie, meant to tell you about it,” Sam clears his throat, “Some indie film, so it’s crazy long. There’s this guy, the hero, doing his thing. Killing bad guys, saving the day. And he wins, of course.” Sam pauses, “You know, conquers evil, comes home, all that stuff. But— here’s where it gets weird. He’s still fighting. Almost like he can’t stop. I mean he’s still doing a great job and it’s fucking impressive, but— it’s like he doesn’t realize,” Sam pauses again, “that this movie is a love story.”

Silence in the kitchen then Sam huffs out a muted laugh. 

“So you’re just watching and waiting, watching and waiting, for him to figure it out,” his voice has settled to something more serious, “Until you kind of just— want him to stop and stay at home. You just want him to stand still long enough to see what’s right in front of him.”

Bucky holds his breath. The whole house is silent.

Sam rustles and shifts to his feet, “Anyway, I’ll queue it up on Netflix. Think you guys will like it.” He sets some dishes in the sink and turns on the faucet.

“Thanks Sam,” Steve’s quiet voice over the white-noise of water falling.

Sam shuts off the water and disappears further into the house, calling out over his shoulder, “I don’t know what he’s waiting for. I'm pretty sure it’s got a happy ending.”

 

* * *

 

“Hey Buck—”

Bucky turns to Steve in his bedroom doorway. It’s just past three in the morning and neither of them should be awake. But their sleep schedules still haven’t settled back into any sort of rhythm after the trip to New York. The house is dark except for the lamp by Bucky’s bed. He walks over to Steve because closeness is never unexpected and now, his door is always open.

“These— uh. These are yours,” he holds out two squares of metal in his hand. Dog tags.

Bucky takes them and turns them over in his hands. He slowly runs his fingers over the name stamped in metal before raising his head.

“You should have them.”

“Why?”

“So you have— something, from before.”

Bucky studies his face, “Keep them,” he drops his eyes before he adds, “I have you.”

 

* * *

 

Tuesday afternoon and the coffee shop is deserted. Just the two of them and two people kept company by their laptops.

Bucky feels out each notch in their table while Steve orders. Something about the way wood warps and nicks. Every mark unique, every fault beautiful. Bucky traces a scrape with his left hand and then again with his right. He can still feel the hint of deeper detail with his flesh and blood hand, but perhaps that just his mind remembering what his left hand has told it.

Steve arrives at the table carrying a tray and grinning. There are a few coffee cups and at least forty shots of espresso.

They take turns drinking a few at a time. Muffled laughter and bright eyes. Watching each other, knees brushing under the table when they shift.

Bucky downs five in rapid succession and looks at Steve expectantly.

A pause.

“Maybe some tingling? Like at the very bottom of my stomach. Or— wait maybe my toes,” Bucky squints, “Nope. It’s gone,” a playful smile.

Bucky suspects that both of their metabolisms are much too fast for caffeine, but that’s not really why they’re here.

Steve, who hasn’t stopped grinning since they arrived, reaches for a shot with one hand and Bucky’s left arm with the other. His fingers close around Bucky’s wrist as he drops the first shot straight down his throat. He grabs another and brings Bucky’s hand to his chest. He presses Bucky’s hand flat to the muscle just next to his sternum, right over his heart. Then quickly drinks the rest of the espresso on the table. 

Maybe twenty shots? Twenty-five? Bucky can’t count when he’s busy feeling every heartbeat through Steve’s shirt. The subtle shift of fabric over smooth skin. The firmness of the muscle it covers.

As the shots disappear, Steve’s heart picks up its pace. _Is it the coffee or is it the touch?_ Bucky’s world narrows to a single point of connection. When Steve downs the last of it and meets Bucky’s eyes, he is too slow to blink back the want.

Steve must be able to see the yearning swirling behind his eyes. The way his body craves this intimacy. The voice that urges him— _fist your hand in Steve’s shirt and pull him in. Kiss him hard and hungry, tongue seeking out his to taste. Make his heart beat even faster. The burnt bitterness of coffee in your mouths, kiss him deeply until you just taste Steve._

 

* * *

 

In the car, Bucky reaching across his chest to run his metal fingers over the car window’s glass. 

“What happened to Peggy?” Bucky asks out of the blue. If there’s a reason for the timing he doesn’t let on, offers no explanation. 

“Oh—” Steve looks up and a familiar range of emotions flits over his face, “She’s— uh. She’s still around. I go see her sometimes,” Steve shakes his head, “I— sorry, I didn’t think you remembered her. Or I would’ve— invited you.”

Bucky nods, turns his eyes out the window.

“It’s just— she doesn’t— remember all the time. Same Peggy in there, it’s just tough to, uh—” Steve doesn’t finish the thought and Bucky doesn’t push it.

Silence settles and hangs long enough for the subject to change.

But Bucky continues, voice neutral, “You kept a picture of her in your compass.”

“Yeah,” Steve pauses for a long minute, then adds, voice soft, “She was my compass.”

 

* * *

 

Their first mission with Bucky’s new arm went flawlessly. Small team, Bucky sticking close to Steve. Chemical weapon disarmament. Two hours from entry to extraction.

A quick trip but they opt to spend the night in a hotel and head back in the morning. No discussion, but the reasons are clear enough. Find a new normal, no matter the chaos. Grip each other and find balance in your constant orbit. They’re smiling easy when they open the door to their hotel room.

“Hey,” Bucky drops his bag by the door, “let me stitch that eyebrow.”

Steve chuckles, “it’s already healing.” Two beds in this room, he stops in front of the one that will cushion nothing but discarded weapons tonight, and shucks off his gloves.

“I know, that’s why I need to stitch it now,” Bucky circles around so he’s just over Steve’s shoulder, talking to his profile.

The Howling Commandos had a medic, Bucky remembers that, or at least he’s stitched that memory into place from the museum exhibit. But Bucky knows he remembers stitching Steve’s skin. Many separate memories sharing a common thread. At home and at war, in his smaller body and his larger one, with delicate skin that bruised and bled and vigorous skin that raced to heal.  Someone told him once he had ‘a sure hand and a fierce protective streak.’

“You should’ve let me set that fingernail, too.”

Steve spins in surprise, “I didn’t know you remembered that,” a smile spreads and he lifts his right hand, laughs and adds, “yeah, it’s still a little crooked.” An imperfection that survived the serum and the years in ice.

Bucky doesn’t have to look. He’s already studied that fingernail countless times. Tracing it’s shape and the memories tied to it. 

Bucky grabs a medical kit from his bag, sits on the bed and gestures to the covers, “Come here.”

Steve sits next to him and Bucky pats his thigh, “Now lay back.”

Steve lays down with no hesitation. He shifts and adjusts his shoulders so he rests on his back, head in Bucky’s lap.

He watches Bucky’s face as he carefully bends the thin needle into a hook and threads it.

Bucky sets it aside and opens a pack of gauze. He cleans the wound, a shallow slash across Steve’s forehead, with iodine, even though Steve doesn’t get infections any more. Bucky inspects the cut, leaning close to Steve’s face. Then, one hand bracing his head, fingers woven into Steve’s hair, he carefully pulls twenty-two neat stitches into place. 

As Bucky knots the surgical thread, his hair slips from behind his ears and falls over Steve’s face. He leaves it, a thin curtain shadowing them from the light in the room. Hands reach for what words push away. Breath mixing together in the air between their faces.

Bucky wants to joke but want is wrapped tight around his lungs. He whispers, “Those’ll probably be ready to come out around midnight.”

Steve smiles up at him and Bucky smiles back, want surging through his stomach, his legs, thinking about how it would feel to kiss him sideways like this.

An unfiltered moment of tenderness. _Is this what ready feels like?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hahaha what is this. 6.6k words?? I wasn't kidding about the chapters getting longer. Hope you're enjoying dear readers!
> 
> If you’re up for something completely different, I wrote a fic where Bucky finds himself through breakdancing: http://archiveofourown.org/works/1964256
> 
> Take a break from emotionally devastating for funny AND emotionally devastating!
> 
> !^.^!


	17. Just Tell Me When

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Answer the quiet questions in his eyes again and again until you both believe it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack Suggestions!
> 
> Forever by HAIM  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEwM6ERq0gc
> 
> You & I by Crystal Fighters  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swQNPyPVsYM

Bucky’s holding a man and snarling at him, spitting angry Arabic in his face. It seems things either go flawlessly or straight to hell. They’re in a too small room with too little light in the wrong part of Cairo. Steve, Bucky, and their four-man, hand-picked team are the only people present who aren’t Egyptian. 

Bucky’s too busy trying to get answers from the terrified man in his grip, the man who was supposed to be their guide to a Hydra weapons outpost, to explain what’s gone wrong. So Steve is leaning down to hear the only other agent on the team who speaks the language, not quite as fluently as Bucky, translating in spurts.

“He says he lied to us.”

The man stutters something and Bucky interrupts him, growling through his mask.

“He’s saying the guide is working for Hydra,” Steve gives her a startled look and she shrugs, “Just trying to break him down. Hydra’s clearly paid him to throw us off.”

Steve picks up on more than the agent can translate for him. Bucky’s hands are tight in the man’s clothes, lifting him off balance. Threatening so, maybe, he can get answers without having to use his knife.

The Egyptian man gestures hysterically and shakes his head. Looks down and words spill out. 

“He says…” the agent hesitates and her brows furrow, “No weapons. It’s people. Hydra is hiding people here.”

Steve turns to Bucky, trying to read him, but his eyes are cold and fixed on the guide’s face. 

His chest is tight and his head begins to pound. They’re not equipped for a hostage situation. They should back out and find another contact.

Bucky’s voice rises, he’s yelling over the man’s words. Demanding something.

Steve looks back at the agent, “The guide says they’re on the move. They’ve been tipped off. If we want to find them— we have to go now.”

Bucky’s already released his grip on the man’s shirt and turned his back. The man slumps, shaking against the wall. Bucky provides even less information to the team, “No weapons. They’re hiding higher ups. He’ll take us but we have to go now.”

Bucky turns to Steve, “Three principals, seven guards. Do you want hostages?”

Steve barely hesitates, he’s asking you— _should I kill seven people, or ten? Should I walk in raining bullets or end some lives and spare others? It’s your call, Steve._

 _Well, if we have to do this right now—_ “Yes. As many hostages as possible.”

They bust three empty safe houses in quick succession. Each time the guide promises with increasingly frantic sounds that the next one will be the one.

The fourth house is rotting away. No lights on, no front door. Steve shakes his head. _This is too dangerous_ , the longer they follow this man the worse it gets. _This could easily be a trap, and if Hydra has paid him off—_

But Bucky stills the group when they’re still 70 yards away. He motions for silence and watches the house. Bucky runs the mission and directs the team but he never tells Steve what to do.

He points to each agent in turn, “Roof. Roof. Back door. Sniper. Entry in one minute. Go.” The agents immediately split up and move noiselessly into the shadows. No streetlights on this block. Just moonlight and city haze to guide them.

Steve doesn't have to ask where Bucky is headed; he likes to walk right in the front door. Bucky slips around dusty house fronts until he’s across the street from the safe house. He doesn’t signal the agents; they know he’ll move in as soon as he can and he expects them— _trusts? does he trust these men?—_ to be in position.

But when they’re crouching, ready to charge—Bucky first, Steve watching his back—Bucky stills and raises his voice instead. He yells something in Arabic at the gaping doorway.

The melodic vowels stretch and linger in his mouth. It’s sharp, clearly a threat, and Steve could have used this time to wonder why Bucky has suddenly decided on a verbal warning. But he is caught up in the sound of his voice. The pure sounds straight from his throat. The characteristic tones that come through no matter what language he’s speaking. That’s what he sounds like, that’s who Bucky is, under everything, those sounds that know no language.

Bucky calls out to the house again and Steve’s eyes trace the line of his nose, the fine dusting of Egyptian dirt in his eyelashes. Bucky steadies his rifle against his shoulder and waits.

A tiny movement makes Steve’s eyes snap back to the house. Suddenly, a man in white linen appears from the gloom. His hands are down by his sides. Bucky yells a short percussion of sounds. The man is still. Bucky yells the same phrase, sharper.

The man moves too quickly and Steve and Bucky react at once. Bucky fires two shots before the man in white linen can find the trigger of the assault rifle rising out the folds of his clothes. Steve dives to tuck both of them behind his shield, just in time.

An eruption of gunfire, pocking the the houses behind them, raising even more dust. The rest of the team, tucked away in their positions, takes over and the enemy fire dwindles. They wait it out, pushed together up against another doorway. Bucky takes out the two remaining gunmen with two shots over the top of the shield.

With their target in sight, the rest of the mission goes surprisingly smoothly. Three Hydra higher ups huddling in a dug-out hideaway. Unarmed and relatively cooperative. It’s what happens on the way out that startles Steve from his mission mind, stops him in his tracks.

Bucky is kneeling outside the door, mask pulled down around his neck. Crouched next to the body of the man in white linen, now washed in red. There’s a little girl, sobbing and clutching the dead man’s back. Bucky’s stroking her hair, making soft sounds that might be language. He sits with her for a minute, voice a fluid constant. The team rustles behind Steve, strapping bullet proof vests to the hostages. Then Bucky lays his hand flat on her back and speaks a few firm sentences that end with a question.

The girl lifts her head and the tears streaking down her cheeks glint in the shadows. Bucky talks to her, holding her eyes. Then he reaches behind his neck and unties his mask. The girl is sniffling, eyes wide, but her attention is entirely on the soldier in front of her. He ties the cloth loose around her neck, a black triangle over her chest. He says a few more words and she nods. He dips his chin and bows his head to her. She stills, looks down at her father, and disappears into the street.

 

* * *

 

“What did you tell her?”

“Who?”

“The girl.”

“Oh,” Bucky’s gaze drops. A pause. “I told her—” Bucky draws a breath, holds it a moment, and lets it fall from his lips. He brings his hand to his mouth.

“I just told her that she has to— that she has a choice. And that she can choose to be strong. That doesn’t mean not grieving. But it does mean leaving the dead behind.”

Bucky studies his hands, “Don’t chase revenge, but you’ll have to fight. Everyone has to fight eventually.”

Bucky turns his head slightly away from Steve, “So when you do, don’t bring your whole self— you shouldn’t bring your heart to war. Do what you have to do. And hide your face so you can come home again.”

Steve reaches out, hand on his shoulder, “Bucky.”

Bucky won’t look at him, Steve tries again, “Buck?”

Bucky’s brows draw together and he keeps his eyes down. So Steve helps him see what he needs to see. A soft touch under his jaw, Steve lifts Bucky’s chin until their eyes meet, his face is so dark and soft and questioning that Steve loses his breath. He whispers, “Why do you have to hide?

Bucky swallows and Steve feels his throat move under his finger tips, “So I can come home again,” his voice is quiet but firm. An answers that answers nothing.

Steve shakes his head, opens his mouth— _what does he mean? what is he afraid of?_ —“Buck, you can come home no matter what. It doesn’t matter, what happens out there,” Steve sweeps his hand into the space next to them, “I don’t care, Bucky.”

Bucky’s eyes flicker. Steve’s hand is still resting easy on his chin and _it would be so easy to_ —“It’s not your opinion I’m worried about,” Bucky whispers back.

“What are you worried about?”

Bucky opens his mouth and huffs a little exhale. His eyes flit over Steve’s face. He shakes his head weakly.

Steve brings his other hand to Bucky’s face, fingers sliding easy up his cheeks, resting on the tender skin by his ears, and Steve’s palm just touching the corner of his lips. Caressing like you’ve always been touching so tender. Holding him the way you do in your dreams. Steve can’t stop his hands from drawing Bucky closer.

Hold his face, hold his eyes, and say, “Home means you don’t have anything to prove.”

 

* * *

 

“Hey,” Bucky appears in the doorway, leaning against the frame.

“Hey,” Steve smiles up at him from the kitchen table. Bucky’s wearing a thin t-shirt and jeans. He looks so soft— _walk over to him. Listen to him speak while your eyes roam. Let your body settle light against his, just pressing him to the door frame. Put your hands on the wall on either side of his head and breathe in the scent from the curve of his neck. Kiss a soft line up his throat and—_

“What are you doing tonight?”

“Uh—” Steve blinks at him, “Nothing,” voice wavering a bit, “What are you— Do you want to? Do something?”

“Yeah,” Bucky glances at the kitchen clock, “If you have a few hours.”

“I do.”

 

* * *

 

The first question mark is the [helmet](http://ravexperformance.com/images/products/detail/2010ThorMotocrossQuadrantMatteBlackHelmetMatteBlack.jpg) in the backseat of the car. Steve’s never seen it before—never seen a helmet that looked anything like it before. Like a motorcycle helmet with brims jutting out above and below the front opening.

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see,” and Bucky smiles at him. There’s something about his smiles now that swells and cracks, shifts and glows. Each one feels different and so vulnerable, like he’s just letting emotions wash over his face, however they come and go.

They drive for over an hour. Bucky obeys every speed limit, uses his turn signals, comes to a complete stop. He’s a better driver than Steve, even though they both know the fake I.D. in his wallet would stand up to scrutiny if he were pulled over. Maybe that’s not why he’s so careful.

They pull into a massive dirt parking lot as the sun is fading to pink behind the evening clouds. A racing track. Bucky grabs the helmet from the back and leads them around a crowd stretched into a line between around metal barriers, to the rear entrance. Steve’s eyes catch on a sign for tonight’s event. _Motocross._

Bucky ducks into a tent with a small sign scotch-taped above the doorway— _Racers._ Steve hesitates, watching the back of his head disappear inside. _He’s racing? What are we doing here?_ He follows Bucky inside just in time to hear him say, “Falsworth, James.”

A grubby man with thick hands is giving him a laminated number and folder of paper, “There ya go Jim,” he gives Bucky a smile that narrows his eyes to sparkling half-moons, “Good luck out there.”

Bucky nods and takes the papers. He turns to see whatever shows on Steve’s face right now and gives him a small, amused smile.

“I need to get ready,” Bucky pushes back out the tent flap doors, “The stands are that way. Meet me back here after?”

“After— what?” Steve stumbles.

“After the race,” and Bucky disappears toward the trailers ringing the track periphery.

Steve wanders into the stands in a daze. _Has he come here before? Is this safe?_ The intense music playing through the track’s speakers is strangely foreboding. He finds a seat close to the front and stares at the dirt track, lit up with flood lights. Two 20-somethings behind him fold papers and talk over the throbbing music.

“What about that guy, Falsworth?”

“Yeah he’s the favorite.”

“Seriously? Did he go to nationals?”

“No, he’s new. Just showed up this season.”

“Where did he race before?”

“Nobody knows. He’s intimidating as fuck. Nice guy though.”

“You talked to him?”

“Yeah, asked him about his arm. Last time.”

“What about it?"

“It’s like— sculpted metal on the outside. Everybody thought it was some kind of sleeve. But why the fuck would he wear a metal sleeve? He’s huge— already the heaviest guy out there twice over. So I asked him if it was a prosthetic.”

“What’d he say?”

“He just nodded.”

“Huh.”

“Probably just fucking with me.”

“You think so?”

“I dunno. That would be a crazy prosthetic. Shit’s insane, working fingers and everything. Unless he’s got some mad-scientist hook up.”

“If it’s not a sleeve and it’s not a prosthetic, then what is it?”

“Dunno, man. Dude’s a mystery. He keeps this black bandana on all the time, too. Even in the pits.”

“Badass.”

There’s a lull in the conversation and Steve turns their words over in his mind.

“So why’s he the favorite?”

“He always wins.”

“Always?”

“Yeah, every race he finishes.”

“Hm.”

“He’s fucking suicidal though. You’ll see.”

Steve blanches and his eyes scan the tops of the trailers over the track fence.

The sun disappears completely and the races begin. Steve watches the competitors ride in through the back gates on motorcycles with thick suspension and knobbly tires. They’re completely covered, helmet, gloves, boots, jackets and pants with stiff padding. _How would they see his arm?_

Steve watches for dark hair wisping out the bottom of a helmet, the characteristic breadth of Bucky’s shoulders. Collects questions in his mind like rain water. _Does he have a bike? Does he have clothes like this? How long has he been doing this? How did I not know?_

Steve anxiety grows with each race. It’s fast paced, deafeningly loud, and has a rough-edged feel. The riders fly off hills and slam into the ground, kicking up dirt clods. The bikes shake menacingly in the landings, riders’ arms flexing to straighten their front wheels. They lean so far over on their bikes in the turns, straining against their momentum. Extending a boot toward the ground flying by beneath them to coast and jump along the dirt, steady their balance. Worringly, every race loses at least a handful of riders to crashes.

But Steve knows Bucky’s ability and in all the chaos, questions gurgling in his mind, Steve’s heart is light with anticipation. Steve hears his new name over the PA system— _another mask_ —before he sees him.

“Number 74! James Falsworth!” The crowd cheers, louder than they have for any racer before him.

Bucky appears, and Steve forgets. The shape of him, straddling a bike, arms braced wide, hands gripping the handlebars, legs bent, feet tucked into place next to the engine. He forgets where he is and what’s about to happen. Bucky’s wearing the same one-armed jacket he wears to war— _of course._ He forgets the track and the stands and the floodlights and the noise. Steve stares at Bucky and forgets his own name.

He gives the crowd a quick wave and Steve distantly wonders if he’s scanning the faces through his helmet. The signal to ready sounds and Bucky stills. Face pointed forward and down, hands easy on their grips.

The race begins and Bucky is mesmerizing. He’s excellent, just as Steve expected, pride a little white flame in his chest. His reflexes are clearly superior, though he’s not as quick in a straight line and his jumps end sooner, no doubt due to his weight. He brakes later and tilts further into turns, steadying himself with his left hand in the dirt instead of his boot. The crowd cheers when he gains a position and quiets when he struggles. _They’re rooting for him._ Steve tears his eyes away to scan the stands and sees more “74” posters than he can count.

Suddenly the world tips and Steve sees it in a new light. _Look at what he’s found. A place to belong. A way to earn respect. Where his skills are praised and he is revered._ Here, his ruthlessness earns him smiles and applause. He deserves it, every second of their admiration. Steve’s eyes return to Bucky.

 _And he brought you here_. He’s building a new world—where he is just a man with a body and a name—and he wants you to be a part of it. 

Bucky comes around a corner tight. Hugging the inside line, leading the race. The rider behind him is slipping sloppy into the curve, closer and closer, fighting his bike, until he nudges up against Bucky’s rear tire. Bucky tries to swing wide, ease out of the turn, but the bike behind him is too close. The rider in second place wobbles again and the bikes collide. They spin, bikes twisting around bodies, and crash hard into a barrier in the center of the track. 

The crowd gasps and hushes but Steve can’t hear them. He’s already left his seat, tearing through the stands toward the track. He’s gripping the railing at the front of the stands, ready to vault it and sprint through the dirt, when the crowd erupts with applause. Bucky is standing up, brushing off his trousers.

Steve stills, grip tight on the railing. Bucky raises a hand to the crowd and the cheering intensifies.

Suddenly Steve’s heart is in his throat and his mind is sinking, spinning— _no, no, no_. Confusion and dread shock through him. _What is it? What_ — It’s Bucky’s purposeful walk back toward the wreck. It’s Bucky’s metal hand fisting into the back of the racer’s collar. Dragging him from the metal tangle. It’s your mind, stitching a rifle into his hand. Knives into the seams of his body armor. Black intention in the bunch of shoulders. It’s your bruised heart flinching at the violence and thinking— _We can start over. Let’s start over._

It’s your racing pulse when he kneels and lifts the man in his arms. Your spinning head when he sprints to the outside guard rail, boots digging in as he scales the dirt slope. The crowd is cheering and clapping, but through Steve’s ears they sound like they’re underwater.

He’s not worried about your opinion. It’s the dark, worried flash in your eyes that tells him— _you haven’t forgotten_. It’s the way you tensed when he was threatening the guide in Egypt, just doing what you asked him to do. It’s the way you stick close to him on missions. He feels your eyes on him, the way you still watch him with questions. 

Because he does kill too quickly. He draws his gun faster than you can raise your shield and you are both afraid of what that means. Even now, it is you blurring the lines between home and war. You’re the one that’s playing out nightmares in your mind: Bucky drawing a hidden gun, blood spattering on the dirt.

Bucky carefully lays down the rider on the sideline and kneels close, helmets touching, probably saying something to him.

And he doesn’t question your concern—so maybe it’s justified. _But he can be so soft._ It feels so normal, so perfect when he’s giving you quiet smiles in the kitchen. So complete when he’s asleep in your arms. So careful and tender when he’s stitching your wounds.

And so hungry for more. Want forces the air from his lungs at the memory of Bucky’s face when Steve touched his arm for the first time. The heat in his eyes, chest heaving slightly, mouth parted just enough to be an invitation. His heart drops to his boots— _you’ve been a fool_. He wants more and you’re waiting for him but he’s waiting for you.

Bucky clasps the rider’s right hand in both of his own. Then lays it by his side and stands. The crowd roars for him as he disappears from the track. He brought you here to show you how the court of the public stage would judge him. 

And they have deemed him a hero.

What is ‘ready’ for a man that holds fragility and savagery in the same body? If you can’t trust him, how can he trust himself? You know it’s hunger in his fingertips when they linger on your skin. And you could chase the ecstasy of his touch, but if he’s not ready— _if he’s not ready—_

It’s not enough to catch him if he stumbles. Because he knows you are watching, waiting for him to trip, and so he believes it will happen. Your questions become his convictions. Guilt is an icy wave.

Steve stumbles out of the stands and weaves through the crowd, brim of his hat pulled low over his eyes, back to the tent. He draws a deep breath and tries to shut away the clamor in his mind— _you’re hiding too_. Steve exhales and raises his head. Bucky is 30 yards away and walking closer, helmet in his hand, jacket unbuckled. Weaving between trailers and tents. He looks up when he’s 20 feet back, catches Steve’s eye, tugs down his mask, and grins. It’s light and charming and his eyes are bright. 

Steve smiles back and he’s just floating, legs and arms just drifting. Eyes closed, missing pieces, your heart is tested and it is just as you feared. You are always falling, trusting the ground to find you, but it never does. You just keep falling and falling, wind whipping in your ears, and now you know. This is the feeling of falling in love.

You’re out of place and right at home, too late and still early. Because the man you love, the man you have always loved, is walking toward you and smiling. Realization is just a chill whisper through his mind and his thoughts quickly hush it— _I know, I already know._

 _Love will have to be an anchor until love can be surrender._ Steve’s heart ignores him. It walks up to Bucky, closing the distance, stopping too close when their faces are just inches apart. It melts soft hands on his face and pulls him in. Kisses him without restraint and whimpers against his skin. It rests his forehead on Bucky’s and breathes sweet promises over his lips— _whatever you need, Buck, I can be that_. _I trust you. I need you. I’m sorry. I—_ It slips drowning man’s hands around his waist and buries Steve’s head in his neck.

But Captain America is stronger than his body. Answer the quiet questions in his eyes again and again until you both believe it. He clasps Bucky’s shoulder, smiles and says, “Good race.”

 

* * *

 

Urban extraction in Bogota. Setting up a sniper’s post on the roof when Steve grips the roof edge and slices his finger on a wire. 

Steve doesn’t even pause to study the cut. The pain barely registers. But Bucky is reaching over him, grabbing his wrist, and pulling it closer. Steve lets him because Steve would let him do anything. Bucky holds his finger close to his face, brows furrowed. He wipes away a trickle of blood with his sleeve and brings Steve’s hand to his mouth.

He cleans the cut, soft lips, hot tongue. His eyes never leave Steve’s so he must see the wave of pleasure that floods him. The shiver that runs up his spine. The surprise on his face. The want he hardly conceals. Bucky drops his hand and smiles. Hungry and heartbreaking at once. Hopeful and doubting. _Does he remember, or—_

Steve holds his eyes, tries to catch his breath, and thinks the words he won’t say— _I love you._

_Let me be everything to you. I want you to belong in my bed instead of visiting. Let me make you moan like you did when I touched your new skin. Let me chase the sound until you’re shaking. Because all I think about is making you feel good._

_Just tell me when you’re ready and we’ll jump._

 

* * *

 

“No, he was in way over his head,” Bucky is smiling, Sam is laughing, Steve is blushing. He chuckles at the look at Steve’s face and continues, “and her face just fell.” Bucky mimics a look of shock and horror and Sam cracks up again. He’s at the tail end of an embarrassing story about Steve and some girl from elementary school he barely remembers. 

Somehow, Sam had figured out that Bucky’s selective memory held on to nearly every one of Steve’s embarrassing moments. So tonight’s dinner conversation has been story after story after story.

“And you let her go?” Sam chokes out in Steve’s direction.

“Yeah he did. She kept the flowers too,” Bucky drops his eyes to his plate again, “Her loss.”

Sam’s laughter quickly dies out. Steve’s eyes snap to Bucky and then Sam, who watches him for a second before letting his face drop with exasperation, as if to say— _are you serious?_

“Hey Bucky, did Steve tell you about this movie I wanted you guys to check out?”

Bucky looks up, shakes his head, looks at Steve.

“Yeah. Action movie. Really think you guys are gonna like it,” he nods emphatically at both of them, “See there’s this guy—”

“Hey, Buck—” Steve interrupts awkwardly, too quickly, “Could you go— grab me some ibuprofen? Uh— right now? I’ve got a terrible headache.”

Bucky stares and his initial confusion blooms into deeper confusion, “How much do you need? Do you want the whole bottle…?”

“Uh,” Steve fumbles and Sam barely stifles a snicker, “Yeah. If you could. Just bring the whole bottle. Thanks.”

“Sure,” Bucky gives him a concerned look but stands and pads into the hall.

Sam jumps in as soon as he’s around the corner, “Steve, I gotta tell you something.”

“Okay.”

“It’s just a suggestion, so— you know.”

Steve watches his eyes, warm but direct.

“I want you to think about getting your own place with Bucky— not that I don’t love you guys living here rent-free and eating all my food. Because I do. And you are always welcome here— I mean that.”

Steve inhales and waits.

“But Steve,” Sam shakes his head, “the, uh— atmosphere around here is crazy thick. Like, I can’t even enter a room without— well— Just think about it. It seems like you guys could use some space. And time.” Sam gathers the last of his dinner onto his fork, “Alone.”

Steve feel his blush hot across his cheeks, “Alright. Thanks Sam.”

Bucky returns shortly after and Steve takes a handful of pills, maybe half the bottle, to save his cover. Bucky and Sam both give him wide-eyed looks but say nothing. Then Bucky and Steve wash the dishes, because they still haven’t fixed the dishwasher, and Sam heads outside in his socks ‘to make a phone call.’

“I didn’t know you remembered all that.”

Bucky hums in reply.

They stand side-by-side. Bucky’s elbow brushes Steve’s as he lifts a cup to the faucet.

“I mean—” Bucky clears his throat, “We don’t really talk about the past, but I don’t remember— I remember you more than I remember me.”

Steve stops scrubbing and looks at his face.

“I just remember— all the pieces of you,” Bucky’s voice has quieted and he lifts his hands to illustrate several separate spots in the air, “and I think— all the space between,” he swipes his hands around the edges, “that was me.”

Steve blinks at his profile and forgets to breathe. _Just thread your soapy fingers into his hair. Push him to the counter and—_

“If not, that’s what I want to be.”

 _Oh, Buck._ Steve’s chest collapses. He drops his eyes and his pulse rushes. _I want that too._ Steve is too still and Bucky looks up at him. Their eyes meet and Steve fights himself. There is nothing he can say that doesn’t end with him gathering Bucky in his arms, kissing up his neck, murmuring in his ear. Steve tries to smile and swallow the ache— _if he’s not ready—_

We waited for decades. We can wait a while longer. As long as you need. _Just tell me when you’re ready and we’ll—_

 

* * *

 

Tuesday afternoon. It’s drizzling but they take the bike because Bucky suggests it. Steve drives with no destination for a while, until Bucky starts pointing to certain streets, signaling turns with taps on Steve’s knees. He’s winding them closer to the center of downtown and seems to know where they’re headed, which is good, because Steve’s mind is lost in the friction of Bucky’s thighs against his hips.

They park in Chinatown and wander the blocks. Bucky asks a shopkeeper in Mandarin about the bonsai in his front window. They try a few pastries from a Chinese bakery. Bucky likes them all.

Then Bucky ducks into a shoe store, asks a few questions, gets directions, and steers Steve down an alleyway. Steve’s heart is jumping. Waiting— _pleading_ —for Bucky’s hands to shove him to the brick, slide up his chest. What else would they be doing back here? Bucky leads him all the way to the end of the alley and knocks twice on a battered metal door. It opens a crack and he leans in, “

“这是一家电影院吗？” Bucky’s voice is confident.

“是的。” The man’s eyes flit between them.

“你们在放映什么片子？”

“香港制造。”

“国语？”

“粤语。” The man shakes his head and moves to close the door.

“有字幕？” 

“有。中文字幕。” The man smirks at Bucky, incredulous.

“好，请给我两张票。” Bucky holds up two fingers.

“你们两位要看？免费。” The man laughs, stares at him a moment longer, and swings open the door. Bucky steps in and motions for Steve to follow.

They weave through towering stacks of pallets and burlap bags, some store’s back room, step through another two doors, and arrive in a tiny, dark theatre. Three rows of ten mismatched seats. There are three older women sitting together in the front row.

Bucky takes Steve’s hand, sending his heart fluttering, and leads him to the back row. They take the center two seats. So narrow and close together that Bucky leans back to put his arm around Steve’s chair. And maybe it’s the cramped set-up or maybe it’s intentional when he lets his fingers brush the back of Steve’s arm.

The lights dim and the movie begins. Foreign sounds and foreign letters flashing across the bottom of the screen. Steve’s not sure what they’re doing here, why he’s watching a movie he can’t possibly understand, until Bucky leans in. His nose in Steve’s hair, lips hovering just above his ear, and he whispers, as softly as he can, “He says, ‘My name is Autumn Moon.’” Steve freezes— _oh—_ , “I quit school after junior high,” want leaps from his chest, closes his throat, “I was no good at studying, but the education system was no better.”

And with that, Steve’s mind gives up trying to keep track of the words. He just listens to the sounds, shuts out everything but the whispers’ heat in his ear.

Bucky translates every line, face toward Steve and eyes toward the screen. Steve drifts in and out of the present moment, spinning fantasies to keep his mind busy and his hands still.

The music swells and drowns out Bucky’s low voice. He pauses to lift his left hand from Steve’s seat back and presses the palm lightly to Steve’s other ear. Steve shudders with pleasure and Bucky’s fingers stretch up into his hair. Gentle pressure to bring Steve’s head just a bit closer, so Bucky’s lips brush his skin with every word. Steve drowns in sensation and strains to stop himself from nuzzling into Bucky’s head, begging for more. 

Then Bucky licks his lips, tip of his tongue just grazing the sensitive skin of Steve’s ear and Steve moans. Nothing close to the surge of lust behind his ribs, but a tiny, breathy sound all the same. Bucky doesn’t react— _he must not have heard_. Though a minute later he curls his fingers and extends them again, moving just slow enough for it to be a caress.

_Just tip your head into his touch. He’ll take the lead and trace the folds of your ear with his tongue until you can’t keep quiet any more. Then he’ll smother your desperate little noises with his mouth, fingers twisting in your hair. Kissing deeply, tongues reaching to declare your filthy intentions. Find his knee with your hand and slide wolfishly up his thigh until you reach the bulge behind his fly. Palm him through his trousers until he’s panting in your mouth, until he’s pressing his forehead to yours, hips bucking, and you can see his dark eyes, glinting in the screen’s flickering light, pleading—_

Steve jolts back to the present. The credits are rolling and Bucky is reading them as well. The screen blacks and two fluorescent lights buzz to life. The older women at the front file out as Bucky loosens his hand from Steve’s head, welcoming the world back in. Steve hesitates a moment, ear still resting against Bucky’s lips, then stands without looking back at him. He leads Bucky out the dented door and back into the comforting hum of the street, where his thoughts won’t echo so loud.

You touch until the hunger is obvious. Until everything Bucky does becomes an invitation for more. Until your intentions are sparking on the surface and you both know exactly what the other wants. _And what you would do to give it to him—_ But he pushed you away and the fact that he’s chasing your pleasure now, bringing you to the edge, doesn’t change that. He is still finding his footing and falling into your arms won’t steady him. He needs to know that he is worthy of love before you wrap him up in it. He has to be the one to jump or he’ll always be hiding those dark questions behind his eyes. 

If you play your cards right, you’ll have decades to find new ways to give him all the happiness he deserves. But you only get one shot at this. _Just tell me when—_

 

* * *

 

“Hey Buck,”

Bucky looks up from where’s sitting at the kitchen table, mug in hand.

“Thanks for taking me to your race.”

Bucky nods and looks back at his mug.

“I’d love to go to more. Or anything— you’re doing. Whatever you want. To share.”

Bucky smiles at Steve’s clumsiness, fond crinkles in the corners of his eyes.

“And I wanted to say. That I think you can be both.”

Bucky meets his eyes, “Both what?”

Steve pieces together these words he’s been mulling over, “Both sharp and soft.”

Bucky waits for more. _He won’t say anything unless you get closer._ Steve walks around the counter and takes the seat next to him. He considers reaching for Bucky’s hand but thinks better of it. Touches mean too much now, so just say, “Being one doesn’t mean you can’t be the other,” he watches Bucky’s cautious eyes and wades in a bit further, “You can be the man who kills a father and the man that comforts his daughter. You already are. You can be the Winter Soldier and a motocross racer and a plant collector and Bucky. You can be your whole self. And you don’t have to worry.” 

Steve looks down at his hands on the table and bites his lip, “I guess that’s what I’m trying to say. Being a person means being many people. All of them matter. All of them belong here.”

Bucky says nothing but his eyes search Steve’s and they watch each other for a long moment. Words aren’t enough and you know it. You have to tell him you trust him and you have to mean it. You have to show him your open arms before he will jump. 

 

* * *

 

When you can’t find your way forward, your dreams draw up a map. Steve turns his head on his pillow. Restless sleep spins restless stories.

_They’re crouched in a house that’s burning, mostly ashes now. Kneeling behind a charred door frame and scanning the outside for— something. What was it? Bucky’s mask is pulled down around his neck and his eyes are sharp on the tree line, some 70 yards away. There’s a cut on his lip and Steve can’t stop staring. Bucky turns his head and Steve catches his chin with his gloved hand._

_Steve leans in, gaze doesn’t leave Bucky’s lips until his vision blurs and he closes his eyes. He draws Bucky’s lower lip into his mouth, slips his tongue over the cut once, and again. Dirt and blood and sweat and electrifying skin. He sucks lightly and releases him but Bucky doesn’t let him pull back. He chases Steve’s lips, two light, searching kisses, first his bottom lip, then his upper lip, tongue flicking briefly against the sensitive underside. They’re both still, too close to see each others’ eyes, noses just touching._

_Bucky’s voice is thick and melted, vibrating in Steve’s chest, “Do it again.”_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A huge thanks to ogawaryoko for translating the Chinese dialog!! :)
> 
> I don’t provide translations for any of the foreign language text in here (I’m a purist, what can I say) but let me encourage you all: if you run any non-English text in this fic through Google Translate, you’ll get the jist. ;)
> 
> (((Do I need to add a tag for irresponsible use of ibuprofen by super soldiers? :/))) 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! ^.^


	18. You Are All of Them (Explicit)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Look out the window to hide your eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has mild EXPLICIT CONTENT (ch 19 will have explicit content too). I've chosen to leave the fic rating on Mature and mark the explicit chapters accordingly.
> 
> \- - - - - - 
> 
> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> Tapes and Money by Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmoFjygynMA
> 
> And a song suggestion for the last scene in this chapter (there will be a link to cue you):  
> Operation Prometheus by Kraddy  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgmhfSuDybA
> 
> Enjoy!

Steve leads Bucky to the garage, grinning the way he does when he’s got a surprise.

“Come here,” he gestures toward himself with two hands and Bucky hesitates. His heart kicks a little and he takes a step closer.

“Turn around.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow and Steve puts a hand on each of Bucky’s shoulders to spin him. Steve presses one hand across Bucky’s eyes and uses the other to trigger the garage door. Creaking as it rolls itself open. Steve leans in a little closer than necessary to murmur, “Let’s walk outside.”

Bucky steps slowly forward and Steve trails close behind, hand still over Bucky’s eyes. When Bucky’s boots tell him he’s stepped from concrete to asphalt, he stops. Steve lifts his hand.

There’s a new truck in the driveway. [A new old truck](http://speedprint.com/deves50/img/yourtrucks/mikeklepplg.jpg). An old style, maybe from the 1950s, but beautifully restored. Bucky walks up to it and lets his fingertips drift over the flawless paint. He takes in the new leather upholstery through the windshield, the sparkling white wall tires, then turns back to Steve.

“Nice truck,” Bucky grins, “Where’d you get it?”

Steve’s face is strangely soft, “A place downtown. Had it restored.”

Bucky turns back to the truck. All black save for the chrome on the grill, “They did a nice job.”

“Yeah.”

Steve hasn’t moved from just outside the garage door. Bucky walks around the back of the truck to the other side, then walks back toward Steve.

“It’s for you, Buck.”

Bucky looks at him, “What do you mean?”

“It’s your truck.”

Bucky blinks, turns to look at the truck, then back to Steve, “Oh—” he watches Steve’s face ease into a proud smile.

Bucky takes two steps back to the truck and rests his hands on the hood to stop himself from resting them on Steve. He blinks at the black paint and says, “Thank you.”

Steve walks over to him and rests his hand just between Bucky’s shoulder blades. He’d know by now, if you weren’t so good at stifling your shivers, that you’re two breaths from losing it every time he touches you there. Something so intimate about it. His hand just resting on your spine, between the muscles of your back. Hold your breath so you won’t moan when he lets it fall, fingers trailing down your spine. 

Bucky is motionless. He swallows with his eyes on the truck to stop himself from spinning, hands catching Steve’s wrists. _Pull him to you, pull his hands behind your back so he’s pressed hard to your body. Let him see the hot aggression in your eyes, let him feel how badly you want it._

“Come look,” Steve grabs his attention again. He’s opened the driver door and stepped aside. They walk around the truck and Steve points out features, details. 

Bucky smirks at the roll bar behind the cabin and gives Steve a wry grin, “I don’t think that’s original.”

Steve blushes in the twilight, “Yeah— Can’t be too safe.”

Bucky’s grin fades, “It’d have to be a hell of wreck to hurt me—” _because I cause wrecks to kill people. When it all goes to hell and there’s metal twisting, glass flying: I’m at home._

“Let’s take it for a ride,” Steve tosses him the keys.

 

* * *

 

Bucky takes them on a long loop out past the street lights. Country roads and moonlight. All the windows down and Bucky’s turned the stereo on. They just drive and drive, music from the speakers so the silence doesn’t ring, lost in their own thoughts.

The warm, fragrant summer night air whips through the car when Bucky turns onto a new street. With the darkness and the air swirling through the car, making the nerves in his left arm hum, the night feels unmoored. Unreal. Bucky loosens his grip on doubt and wonders.

_Pull over and park the car. He knows what you’re doing; he’ll meet you halfway there. A messy kiss over the[middle of the seat](http://image.customclassictrucks.com/f/featuredvehicles/1004cct_1950_chevy_pickup_truck/27108671/1004cct_02_o%2B1950_chevy_pickup_truck%2Brestored_interior.jpg). Fingers tangling in your hair like they belong there. Gasping over each others’ lips. Grip his hips and pull him toward you, till his back is flat on the seat and his feet are braced against your door._

_Tug off his boot and dig your fingers into the sole of his foot, make him moan. Bent over him, tongue in his mouth to taste the sound. Grind your hips and groan._

_Or crawl over him just as he is, straddling him in his seat, forearms on his shoulders for kisses that melt into kisses, never pulling back, barely remembering to breathe. His hands searching under your shirt._

Let your knees slide a bit further apart, one foot still on the gas pedal, and imagine it’s his hips between your thighs. Look out the window to hide your eyes.

Resolve rests and want tells you what to do. _Pull over and tell him what he means to you. Trip off the cliff together. No such thing as mistakes when you’re this far gone._

 

* * *

 

Steve suggested they plant some new bushes outside Sam’s house. As a gift it seems, but Bucky’s not sure what the occasion is.

Steve heads to their shower and Bucky washes the soil from his hands in the kitchen sink. He takes his time. Moments like this, when his hands are slick and soapy, slipping against each other, his brain crackles to process all the sensation. The signals from his left hand are so strong that his mind can’t match every impulse to a bit of skin. 

His brain swims through it, trying to make sense of it. The feel of his hands sliding against each other seems to come from something else, something he can’t see. Disorienting but wonderful, pleasure from an unseen source.

 _You feel._ Isn’t that all there is? You feel now; more than you should. Doesn’t that make you human? Steve touches you and you melt. That’s all there is to it. 

Bucky studies his new arm under the water’s flow and wonders what this body felt like before. 

Before he lost and gained and lost and gained this limb. Back when he was unquestionably human. Before his brain jumped at sensation after years of deprivation. Did your mind still shut down when Steve touched you? Did your eyes always follow his movements so closely? Did you make every moment of closeness an invitation? And did he ever accept?

 _I should know. I should remember that._ But you don’t. _So just ask._

Bucky heads up the stairs. The shower is off but the bathroom door is closed. He could wait— but he’s feeling bold, so knock before you lose your nerve.

Bucky knocks twice.

“Yeah?” Steve’s muffled voice.

“Hey. Can I ask you something?”

The door swings open almost immediately. Steve’s standing there with a towel around his waist, looking a little wide-eyed. Bucky blinks at a spot over Steve’s head and waits out the hot rush in his stomach. Want swims up with a few ideas for how to get that towel off but Bucky smothers them. Inhale— _shit, the smell of him straight out of the shower, just soap, hot skin, damp hair_ —and say, “What— uh, what were we before?”

Steve blinks at him.

Bucky continues, feeling more unsteady every moment, “I mean. Before the war. In Brooklyn. What was I to you?” _though what I really want to know is— what were you to me? I should— I should— but I can’t remember._

Steve is slow to respond. Bucky watches his face try to work out what he’s asking. He’s already told and retold every memory he has, but it’s not a memory you’re asking for. “You were my best friend,” his voice sounds strange. This conversation is probably just as startling to him as it is to you. 

“What was I like?” Bucky sees the obvious questions flitting over his face— _What do you mean? Why ask now? You’ve been back for so long now. You’re already someone new._

“You were—” Steve falters for a second over the past tense, “Confident. Funny. You were very— protective.”

Bucky studies the look on his face.

He’s guessing why Bucky has asked, trying to answer the questions behind the questions, “You didn’t want me to go to war.”

Bucky waits for more. Turning his words over, letting his gaze slip to Steve’s wet shoulders. But nothing more comes. Hold his eyes to ask, “If I were here now, would I ask you to stop?”

Steve’s face falls a bit so Bucky explains, “Stop fighting. Stop going to war.”

“You are here now.” He doesn’t want to answer the question.

“You know what I mean. If the guy you grew up with was here. Would he ask you to stop?”

“He is here,” Steve’s voice is too quiet. He’s standing too still, eyes clear and focused on Bucky.

Bucky is firm, “Steve. Answer the question.”

Steve’s silence makes it perfectly clear. He doesn’t need to say it now but he will anyway, just a whisper, “Yes.” Silence snaps, “You would.”

Bucky exhales. He watches Steve’s face, concern settling in around his mouth. _So why don’t I?_ _Why can’t I just ask him to stop?_

They stand still on either side of the doorway. _That’d make you a hypocrite, wouldn’t it._

Steve sees the cliff edge crumbling in Bucky’s grip, “We were going to stop. We were going back to Brooklyn after we stopped Hydra,” Steve pauses. Bucky’s eyes are on the bathroom linoleum. “If it hadn’t proved bigger than us both, we would have gone home.” 

Bucky spins into the dark, no anchor. He can’t meet Steve’s eyes.

“But— here we are,” Steve’s voice is affirming, “We’re still here.”

“And we’re still fighting,” Bucky’s rough whisper finishes for him, “Why don’t we stop?” _You’re supposed to keep him safe. You’re supposed to be the line that pulls him home again. But you’re just a shadow with a gun. When violence races up you embrace it._

“Maybe—” Steve’s voice is scratchy, “Maybe we just realized that there will always be something to fight for. Something to protect.”

“Or destroy.”

A pause before Steve asks, “What do you mean?”

“You don’t have to avenge me,” _since I’m asking I’ll give you the answers, too,_ “You said you swore you’d end Hydra when I died. You don’t have to do that. Not for me.” Bucky draws a breath. _But— I don’t think that’s why you do it._

Bucky looks up to see that Steve’s eyes are wet. _You’re running, just like me._

 

* * *

 

In the kitchen, making whatever you’d call a meal at 2:30 pm. Steve’s minding the stove and Bucky’s pouring glasses of water. He quickly sidles in behind Steve, flicks open the cabinet next to his head, and reaches up for a little-used bowl.

Bucky’s body presses flush to Steve’s for a fleeting moment. Bucky’s stretched chest on Steve’s back, hips just brushing the back of his trousers. Just testing. Just feeling. Just pushing him, just looking for that buzz. You shouldn’t have started chasing pleasure. Now you can’t stop.

After mid-afternoon meal, Bucky heads into the living room and waits for Steve. He takes out his phone and slouches so his head rests halfway down the couch back and his hips are near the edge of the cushion. He tucks his bare feet up on the very edge, up against his hips, so his knees are fully bent.

Steve appears in the doorway, pauses a second, then comes to sit on the coffee table in front of him. Bucky’s knees are spread and they talk through his legs. Bucky knows exactly how he looks. Hair a bit tangled against the back of the couch, Shoulders pushed into the seat back, the way his shirt is bunched up over his chest. Just one of many invitations. Steve’s eyes are roaming over him and the lust that’s always rolling around in his frame rumbles.

“Come here,” Bucky uses a lull in the conversation to pat the couch next to him.

Steve comes, and as he settles close and leans in closer, Bucky pulls up some video he’s kept sitting on his phone. 

“Watch this,” _but really, just stay close. Just sit here with your leg pressed to mine and your breath warm on my collarbone. Here’s an excuse so we don’t have to talk about it._

A few seconds into the video, Bucky realizes Steve’s hand is on his foot. Steve shifts, curls his fingers to wrap them around the arch, and Bucky’s feeling a little breathless. It takes nothing at all, just the suggestion sets you off. Steve tightens his grip, thumb stretching to stroke a line from his heel and Bucky’s eyelids drift.

 _Fuck, just turn your head and kiss him._ Everyday you find a new way to hesitate. You won’t pull him in and you can’t push him away. Something happens in the video, some weak excuse, and Bucky laughs, then turns his head to see Steve’s reaction. Just enough to touch him, Bucky’s hair resting on Steve’s forehead. Lingers just a little too long and turns his face back to the screen.

You think you’re standing still but you’re slipping.

The video ends and Steve is slow to move away. “Stay there,” Bucky murmurs while flicking through his phone.

Steve stays, won’t even ask you for a reason.

“I want a picture—” _of us._

Bucky lifts his phone and clicks the shutter before he can think better of it. He lowers the phone to see the image, flushes deeply, and drops it face-down on his slouched chest.

“Good?”

“Yeah,” Bucky’s voice is rougher than he’d like.

Steve gets up and wanders off on some excuse. They usually do after a moment so close their hearts have lost their rhythm. Like they both know they can’t stop the slip with the other in arm’s reach.

Bucky lifts his phone to see the picture and flushes all over again. _We’re so close._ It’s different seeing them as an image, from outside yourself. _It’s so obvious._ Steve’s starry eyes, smiling softly at the camera. His head is tucked and turned toward Bucky. And Bucky’s own face, hair tousled, wisping over his forehead, giving the camera some dark look, eyes shadowed, pupils blown, the corner of his lips turned up like a secret.

_We look like lovers._

_Aren’t you? Chasing each other’s shivers and gasps. He doesn’t have to have his tongue in your mouth; he wants your touch and you give it to him. What else would you call this?_ You didn’t mean to put your wants before your convictions. Too late now.

 

* * *

 

You need to talk to him. Maybe the path’s not clear. Maybe it’s a mistake. Maybe you’re too optimistic. But you’re a mess and your hungry hands are reeling him closer. Tell him before you lose your voice.

Bucky stands and leaves his room. Just one step into the hall and he sees Steve through his open doorway. Wearing suit pants and a dress shirt, buttoning the collar down.

“Are you headed out?”

“Yeah—” Steve turns to face him, “We’ve got this thank you dinner. Some Senators that wanted to patch things up after the tribunal. Sam’s coming too, you’re welcome to—” Steve lets the sentence hang. _You’re welcome to come— and pretend you’re someone you’re not._

Steve drops it and finds a way to get closer, “Will you button these for me?” He shakes his open shirt cuff at Bucky with a smile.

Bucky comes without a word. _Tell him you need to talk and he’ll stay._ He’d blow it off if you asked him to. Bucky slips each button into its loop. Their hands brush and it feels so normal. This closeness, your new reality. 

_No, wait till tonight._

 

* * *

 

About an hour later, Bucky’s [alone in the house](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgmhfSuDybA) for the first time in a long time. He moves from the kitchen to the living room to his bedroom. Feeling restless and a little too exposed. He settles on the bed and his mind pulls him along, swallowed emotions floating to the surface, nothing to distract him. First, it reminds him of their first ride in the new truck. Day dreaming of pushing Steve around on the leather seats, his stomach swells. Then it replays that day at the theatre. How Steve was so far gone, his quiet moan when Bucky licked his lips. Bucky’s hand is on his fly. As if he needed another push, his body supplies the same weightless feeling he had when Steve held Bucky’s head in his hands to comfort him, remind him he had nothing to prove.

Bucky slides a hand over the crotch of his jeans, cock already stiff, and huffs a breathless sound at the pleasure curling down his legs. 

This isn’t the first time he’s touched himself and thought of Steve, but it’s the first time he’ll admit it to himself. The first time he’ll imagine Steve, straight out of the shower, letting his towel fall. _Bucky would fall to his knees, hands on the back of Steve’s legs, tongue immediately tracing the grooves of his hips, down and down, until he pauses to find Steve’s eyes and nuzzle the base of his cock._ It’s the first time he’ll push himself from his bed and walk to Steve’s room.

His cock twitches at the smell of his room alone. Bucky crawls onto Steve’s bed and lays on his back. He unzips his fly and pushes his pants down his thighs. Cock already achingly hard. Just the thought of it. Just being in his room, wishing he was here to pin you to the bed. Bucky rucks his shirt up off his stomach.

He settles his right hand around his cock, strokes once and groans. Bucky turns his head to breathe in Steve’s smell from his pillow. He strokes himself and slides his left hand over his chest. The sensation is still foreign and it’s not hard to imagine, from the way his mind drinks it in, that the electrifying fingers on his skin are Steve’s.

Waves of pleasure start to rise and Bucky’s abdomen tenses. He slips his left hand down to his inner thigh and digs in with his finger tips. Close moments flash by like some erotic montage he didn’t know he was creating. Steve’s head on your chest. Steve pulling you close when he thinks you’re asleep. Steve’s leg resting on top of yours. Steve’s lips against your ear. Your lips against Steve’s ear. 

 _Look at you. What are you doing?_ Bucky closes his eyes and comes. Mouth falling open, legs shaking. Cum shoots in hot strands.

He lays panting for a long moment. Then breathes in the scent from Steve’s pillow one more time. Bucky sits up and swings his legs over the edge of the bed.

He looks down at himself, half-naked, stomach wet and sticky.

You look like lovers because you are. And it is deeper than wanting his body. He anchors you and comforts you. He is the one with his hand on your heart, coaxing it to beat. And even when you push him away he waits for you. 

You are in love with him. That wasn’t supposed to happen.

But what did you expect? You knew exactly how he felt the first time your eyes locked on the sidewalk. You followed him back here anyway and rooted yourself in his life again. Now you belong here. And he will kill for you. He’ll become the monster you made yourself to be to keep you alive. And that wasn’t supposed to happen.

Bucky stares at the floor and takes out his tired heart, inspects its bruises. You came back here and tied your heart to his. But you are violence and you will hurt him. You already have. _How did you let this happen?_

Despair floods him, displacing the air in his lungs. If you weren’t enough for him before you fell from the train and lost those pieces of yourself on your walk through hell, then you certainly aren’t enough now. Trust the judgment of the man you used to be.

You can come home to the cage and join his team and sleep in his arms and learn to joke and laugh like humans do but you are dark and there is no one to blame. You made yourself. 

I thought you said there would always be time to run. _So run._ Rip open the seams you’ve closed by stitching your wounds to his skin. Before he claims the rest of you.

Because Steve wants many things that will hurt him and you are all of them. 

 _I thought you were his shield._ But what are you really? Just a story told at a diner and a bag of knives. And a bedroom. A seat at a kitchen table that no one else sits in. A mug for tea. A morning routine. A row of plants that expect your attention. A mind full of movie plots. And now when he fights he expects you at his back. And when he sleeps he reaches for you. And when he wakes he calls for you. And smiles. You are all of this. And that is a tremendous responsibility. Your heart has been swimming in milk that your hands are too dirty for.

Steve should be able to come home without bringing the war back with him in the next plane seat. No one should have to live with savagery sleeping in the next room. Do what you made yourself to do and save him from himself.

 _You have to leave._ Black determination. The same iron core that lets you pull the trigger without weighing the death. But his heart leaps to his throat— _no, no, no. I can’t. I can’t—_

 _Save him because you are selfish._ Bucky can’t breathe. _Not now. Not now. But soon. I’ll go soon. Just a little bit longer._ Bleed out your misery on his sheets, leave pitiful tear stains that will be dry by the time he gets home. Your heart is weak and foolish. It does not know what your hands have done.


	19. So Give In (Explicit)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How strong are you? Can you live another lifetime of maybes?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has EXPLICIT CONTENT. I've chosen to leave the fic rating on Mature and mark the explicit chapters accordingly.
> 
> \- - - - - - - -
> 
> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> Rawnald Gregory Erickson the Second by STRFKR  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Z8oYH_bhnA
> 
> There’s also a scene in here that’s written to a specific sound from a DJ’s bass test. It just has that perfect, right-on-the-edge quality. There’ll be a link in the text to cue you when to start this one! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6eFCLsFZSA

It’s the first formal function Bucky has agreed to come to and Steve is cursing his luck. Open bar, loud music, crowded room. Steve thought it would be a relatively low-key meet-and-greet, but no. Fortunately, Bucky doesn’t seem fazed. Though he has kept his back to his wall for most of the night. Steve has just finished making the rounds, shaking the hands he needs to shake, and is making his way back toward Bucky.

He passes close to the bar and hears a man slurring, “C’mon babe. Don’t be such a bitch.”

Steve’s eyes snap to his face, leering close to the woman sitting next to him. She moves to stand and he catches her wrist. He twists it enough to make her shoulders tense and says, “Don’ leave. You said I could show you a good time.” 

She shakes her head but he doesn’t let her go. Steve is already moving in. He drops a heavy hand on the man’s shoulder and says, “It looks like she’s not interested.”

The man’s bleary eyes focus on Steve’s face, “Hey, fuck you pal.”

Steve is unmoved, “Let her go.”

The man releases her with a sneer, then clumsily shoves Steve’s chest, “The fuck do you think you are.”

Anger rises thick in Steve’s throat and part of him wants the guy to take a swing so he can show him exactly who he thinks he is. The drunk man is on his feet now and he’s stepping closer with angry eyes. Steve waits for his fist. 

A flash of dark hair and Bucky’s appears over the drunk’s shoulder. The man’s left hand disappears behind his back and his face flashes from surprise to fear to pain. Bucky’s speaks in hushed tones, right next to his ear, and lets him go. His eyes are cold but the man doesn’t even turn around to see them. He walks straight to the exit, looking surprisingly well-balanced, moving a little too quickly.

 _He’s using discretion._ Just a flicker of violence, the merest suggestion, is all he needed here. _And you were ready to raise your fists._ Steve smiles at him and Bucky smiles back, eyes melting to warmth again.

 _Can he see it now?_ The light in your eyes. You trust him. Here and everywhere. Or should you pull him close, a moment of quiet in a loud place. Hold him in your arms and speak the words straight through his skin?

 

* * *

 

They get home late and shower one after the other. Steve first, then Bucky. Steve sits on his bed and listens to his quiet footsteps from the bathroom to his bedroom. Bucky pauses in front of his doorway and leans in, “Goodnight.”

The word sticks in Steve’s throat. He swallows twice— _Bucky, come here_ — _what if we_ —“Goodnight.”

He disappears and Steve stares at his ceiling. How long can you wait? Your skin aches for him. You gape at him because you can’t think straight when he’s close. But isn’t that always the agony of waiting? You don’t know when it’ll end? But it will— _right? It has to._

As Steve slips into sleep, he imagines he catches the faintest whiff of Bucky’s scent on his pillow. 

_Months ago, coming home. You swing the door open and he’s right there._

_Before you learned the agony of waiting. Before he started reeling you closer and closer, testing your resolve. When you see his bright eyes, the way he’s leaning against the wall, just give in. Wait until he approaches you, reaching for your bag. Then drop the handle and grasp his wrist. Lean in, close and quick, to catch him with a kiss._

_Or when you were laying in the grass at the zoo. Close and warm and sleepy. Your hand in his hair, his lips breathing soft, contented sounds. Lean in and kiss him when it’s just the two of you and nothing else. Wake him up with warm lips and kiss him slowly again and again. Slide your fingers through his sun-warmed hair and tell him with touches what he means to you, the melt in your chest that becomes tenderness on his skin. He wouldn’t even open his eyes._

_Or when he was buttoning your shirt sleeves for the first time. When he reached out to touch you and caught your eye with that same look, dark eyes to hide a fluttering heart. Let your fingers weave between his and close the distance until you’re just breathing close and warm. Watch the flush over his face for a moment, the anticipation sparking between you, before you tilt your head and—_

 

* * *

 

In the next room, the man you love twists in his sleep, caught in the clutches of—

_Doors, nothing but doors. No ceiling, no floor somehow. Just doors that won’t open. And you want out. Immediately. Your brain is racing with a terror your body doesn’t know how to feel anymore. Bucky yells, voice shaking horribly. It’s not even words spilling from your mouth, just wretched, wordless sounds._

 

* * *

 

_Or when he killed Kölbel. One shot right between his eyes. You recall the moment and the director of your dreams stifles the gunfire. Bucky fires his shot and walks closer and closer, dark figure approaching. You are so thoroughly lost in his image that you hardly move until he is directly in front of you. You stand as he steps up to your chair. One swift motion: he pulls down his mask, pulls you tight to his chest, and kisses you. Direct and hungry and as obvious a declaration of love as the dead man laid out, bleeding at your feet._

_Or later that day, when fate gave you a quiet moment with him. When you came to his hotel room and he was there, tending his wounds, waiting for you. And you watched him, shirtless and angry at your recklessness, exposed in so many ways. You spoke words that seemed important then; you can’t even remember them now. You should have kissed him when he turned to you. When he was questioning you and himself and your missions and the war. When he was looking to you for answers and you were lost in the sudden rush of—he’s back. I can’t believe it. I really got him back.You should have crowded him to the counter and run your hungry hands over his skin. You should have kissed soft lines over his collarbone, his shoulder, his chest, his neck, and apologized with each soft press of your lips for not doing this sooner. For not being brave enough to chase what you really wanted. Breathe in his ear like he did in yours and bring him to the very edge, his hands gripping your arms as he breathes out your name._

_Or if not then, then you should have done it in the hallway. When he chased you because neither of you ever wants the closeness to end. When he called out and you turned, you should have walked back. And drank the beautiful German sounds from his lips when he reprimanded you. Pushed him back into his room and demanded more foreign sounds from his tongue. Made him talk while you pinned him to his bed. Tugged off his boots. Unzipped his trousers and exposed the rest of his skin. Made him speak in languages you couldn’t understand just to hear the sounds start to slur as you explored his body._

_Your mind spins deeper into your well of memories and finds a thousand almosts. A thousand first kisses. A thousand moments that could have been._

 

* * *

 

_They won’t open. They won’t ever open. And you will always be trapped here, slamming your battered body against each door. Your shoulder is already badly bruised and there is a trickle of blood under your shirt from a splinter that snagged your skin. Cry out. Cry out until you lose your voice. Cry out and spend all the air in this space on futile pleas. No one can hear you suffocating._

_There’s something too dark about the shadows. Bucky’s eyes roll wild in his head and he pushes his face up against the doorframe, trying to shut out this place and curl back into his own mind._

 

* * *

 

_And if you had acted sooner, what could you have done with all the moments that took your breath away? Could you have given him back those flighty feelings with pressure and heat?_

_When you saw Bucky walking up in that underground CIA hallway. And he gave you that dazzling, star-struck smile. You could have been quicker on your feet and taken advantage of the knowing glow in his eye. Given some weak excuse to get rid of his companion and hurried him into the bathroom down the hall. Pressed him to the cool tile and asked his smirking lips if he was just there to push your buttons. You could have teased him instead of watching him walk away. You could have rumpled his trousers down by his ankles and slipped curious fingers just under the band of his underwear. You could have surprised him back._

_Or when he showed up in Croatia and denied death its claim on you. When he shielded you with his metal hand and killed from behind your shield. When the silence rang out and he let you raise your head, you shared a look too dark and close. But if he had already known the taste of your lips, you would have leaned in, pressed him to the door frame with your arms either side of his waist. Pushed up his mask and kissed him softly to show him that you love every side of him, even those that are sharper than you are._

_Or later that night in your tent, when he was vulnerable and opening his book of fearful memories for you. When he slept in your bed because you asked him to, your missing pieces gathered in your arms. And when you woke with his leg over you. If he already knew what he meant to you, you could have given him the pleasure you made yourself to give him. Kissed him and touched him and held him until he was at the edge, past it. His hand behind your neck, whispering as you suck a bruise under his jaw_ — _Steve, please—_

 

* * *

 

_When you have all but given up your body, your life to escape this place, you lift your head. And with hopeless eyes you turn to face the closed doors that box you in. But behind you there is light. And air and smell and a cool breeze and the sounds of a wild field. A door has opened. You stare at it and can’t believe your eyes._

 

* * *

 

_And what you could have given him, all the reassurances, all the proclamations, all the daydreams you swallowed. What could your touch have done to assuage his fears?_

_When he showed you his plants and hope filtered like sunlight through the window. When he was nearly too bright to look at. So happy and confident. So proud and settled and at home. Through all of this he showed you he trusted you and what you could have used that trust to show him. If you had swept him from his kitchen chair to the floor in front of the cabinets. If you had made his blood rush with your touch, no kissing, just breathing warm, wet air over his skin. Hands finding every spot that makes him gasp. Until his cock was hard and pressed to the seam of his trousers, while he lay slouched against the cabinet fronts, hands loose at his sides, one knee bent with his foot flat on the floor and the other splayed to the side. Melted and slurring and sensitive. You could have unzipped his pants with a light touch, achingly slow. Then slipped your hand inside, just cupping and palming him through the thin fabric of his underwear. He would have let slip a helpless, needy sound, looking irresistible as he arched his back, pushed himself into your touch. And you could have leaned in close to his lidded eyes, just breathed over his flushed lips while you traced shape of his cock, felt the way it curved, lifted away from his body when it was this hard, and groaned—oh my god, Buck. Oh my god._

_And when you couldn’t resist any longer, you would have paused. Paused and taken him in. Destroyed and waiting for you. So lost to pleasure brought by your hands. Paused to consider the possibilities: everything you haven’t done yet but so desperately want to try. When your body found its own voice and want was so thick and heavy between you that you just breathed it in like water—choke, it’s too thick for your lungs—and watched his lust-darkened eyes. Trust in this, too: the way he waits for you to do whatever you want with him._

_Or when Natasha showed up with good intentions and asked if you were ready to date. You could have given him words. You could have left no doubt and said I’m in love with the man at the table. Even if he is not ready I am here for him if he wants me. And if he wanted you then you could have taken him in your arms and drowned every doubt with your lips. This time nothing but kisses. Taken him on the couch, crawling over him, nosing clothes aside to kiss new skin. Trace his navel with your tongue. Resist the urge to grip his body with your hands and just groan into soft kisses down the inside of his thighs. Lower and lower, asking with kisses if he wants what you want to give him. Nuzzle the base of his cock, the sensitive folds, soft weight of his balls. Listen to his thirsty sounds when you draw one into your mouth and suck. Then let your lips find the tip of his cock and just press a kiss to the head. He’s watching you, holding so still. Your lips slacken and open, head of his cock resting on the wet inside of your bottom lip, so your tongue can explore the grooves, the slit. Slide your tongue out to welcome him deeper. Stroke and suck until he’s nearly gone, then give your hands their chance. Sit on the couch and pull him into your lap. Make him come with a slick fist around his cock so you can feel him in your arms, shaking against you. Use your other hand to press his forehead to your cheek when his body is tensing with pleasure, so you can feel his moan vibrate in your throat._

_And maybe you should have told him anyway, even if he wasn't ready, when you pulled him up from under that bridge. When you thought you’d lost him. When you held him close with shaking arms and if you had kissed him, he would have tasted the desperation on your tongue. Because if he wasn’t afraid of himself and the affection he doesn’t seem to think he deserves, you could have given him every tenderness for every violence you made him endure. You should have found a way to show him exactly what he deserves and how your vision blurs when you think about giving it to him. You could have taken him back to your hotel room and kissed him while you pulled off his clothes. Whisper the stuff of your dreams in his ear as run your fingers over his cock, drawing soft lines over his balls, down and down to creased, sensitive skin and pushed the tip of your finger just inside. You could have used his trust to make him gasp and swim in a flush of pleasure._

 

* * *

 

_Spin, eyes stupidly wide, to see they’re all open. Every door. So wide that the doors have swung open further than their frames and all you can see is the space beyond. It isn’t what you thought. This isn’t what you meant. Your spent lungs draw shaky breaths and you try to steady yourself with a hand over your eyes._

 

* * *

 

_And think of what you could have built in fear’s place. What would have grown where doubt used to wither?_

_If you had been brave enough to jump when he said he’d follow you to Brazil. Or maybe you were just testing the net. Maybe all you wanted was a reason to explore those bounds. And maybe you didn’t have to go further than the other side of a locked bedroom door. A mess of fabric and skin with him. Clothes in a pile on the floor, sucking his cock because it’s all you think about doing these days. You could have pushed his legs up over his head. Teased along the seam of his balls, circling until you found that soft pucker of skin. Lick once over the opening and nearly lose yourself at the sound he makes. Then chase it, tongue pushing deep inside, hands holding his thighs. Hush his moans with fingers over his lips, then stifle your own sounds when he draws them into his mouth. Sucking, smiling around your fingers. Slick tongue, heavy breaths making your nerves jump._

_What could he have told you to do if he wasn’t urging you to go out with Natasha and that hopeful-looking date. What if you hadn’t even answered the door because you were naked and tangled and panting at each other. If Bucky had you pushed up against the headboard with two fingers deep inside you. Stroking slow, kneeling over you to kiss your forehead, cock hanging heavy and full between his legs. The doorbell rings twice, maybe three times, and Bucky doesn’t even notice. He’s watching his fingers in awe, pushing his head against yours, growling in your ear, biting your shoulder. Adding a finger and gasping. He’d rub his cock against your thigh and his back would arch. He’d moan breathlessly—Steve— you feel so good. I want you— I want to fuck you so bad. Bucky would slip out his fingers and just touch the head of his cock in their place. You’d be shaking with how badly you want it, so far past the point of asking. Just reach for his hip and pull him closer, push his cock inside. Delicious stretch, heat and slow friction. So close to coming that your body forgets everything but the feeling of him inside you._

_And—fuck—what you could have done with those first touches and his new arm. When he melted under your fingertips and set your skin on fire. What a mess you could have made of Stark’s couch, kissing and groping. Groaning and demanding less clothing, more skin._ Steve’s shivering, his cock achingly hard against his sheets. _You could have watched him explore himself with that arm_ —Steve’s breath catches— _and when you couldn’t wait any longer, you could have asked him to fuck you with those new fingers. Watching his pleasure-wrecked face, with his fingers inside you, his chest heaving, and drowning in sex’s beautiful, devastating cycle: the greatest pleasure, the kind you chase the moment it fades, is bringing ecstasy to the face of another. To the face of the man you love._

_And when you were spent and melted into one against the leather cushions, you’d both laugh, neither knowing who started it. Because every close moment is a thrill. And happiness is stroking the palm of his hand and feeling him nestle deeper in the nook of your neck. Because it shouldn’t be this good. But it is and you’ve finally outsmarted them all. For once you haven’t gotten the raw end of the bargain. You fell in love, and even though they made you both too strong, you made yourselves to fit together. You made yourselves to fall in love before you even knew its name._

 

* * *

 

_You drop your hand and the doors are gone. Stagger to hold your ground, now the world is slipping away. I thought you couldn’t move if your feet were firmly planted but you have lost your footing._

_You should have known every door opens. And once open, it’s hardly a door any more. Now just a space. And a space made of spaces is just a space. Reality warps and the doors disappear. You are not where you were. Run. Run. Run._

 

* * *

 

_The moments accelerate until every moment, every minute with Bucky could have been a first kiss, or a hundredth kiss. Every second could have been bliss. How strong are you? Can you live another lifetime of maybes? Of almosts and swallowed moments? Can you dream of making him shake and keep your hands off his skin in the morning? Can you stifle your moans when he invites you closer?_

_When he gave back your dog tags. When you drank too much coffee and made him flush. When he took you for that long drive in his new truck. Every time. Can you resist every time?_

_Look how many chances he’s had. Stitching your eyebrow, face hovering over yours. Cleaning your cut with his mouth in Bogota, watching you want him. When he told he wanted to be the pieces around you. In the theatre when he made you moan—he must have heard._

_How close were you then to laying back, clothes disheveled, in his lap? To resting your head against his shoulder and letting pleasure wash over you both. Bucky stroking your cock with one hand, the other hand under your shirt, finding new ways to get you closer, three fingers pinching your nipple like a question. You’d moan_ — _Yes, Bucky—please_. _Then he’d shift his lips from your temple to your ear, nip the lobe before pushing his tongue deep inside. You feel his lips smiling against your skin at your helpless whimpers_ —Steve’s sleeping body too worked up, so close to coming— _Bucky pulls away just far enough to whisper, voice thick—is this what you wanted?_

 

* * *

 

_But isn’t this what you wanted? I thought you wanted out. But I didn’t want— I didn’t mean— You’re frozen. Every door opens and you can’t go back. But you can’t go forward either. You thought you wanted this._

_Look at yourself. Just standing here. What do you want? Shouldn’t you know? Why were you trying so hard to get out if you didn’t want— But I do want— I just didn’t think—_

_Bucky’s anxious thoughts spin and spin until they’re just static. He stands still in this new place._

 

* * *

 

 _But then you’re back in the kitchen. He’s crying_ —I am your fucking shield. _You’re looking at him and you can’t breathe._ The heat in Steve’s bones drains away in an instant. 

I will die before you— _and you’re already reaching for him. The scene replays, every word exactly as you remember it. Exactly as you’ve replayed it again and again when you can’t sleep. You fumble for words when you just want to hold him and when you try to confess there’s five points of pressure on your chest. You just want him to know_ —Steve, fuck— _but you let him go. Watch his back disappear._

_The scene resets and you try again. Same lines, same tears, same hand against your chest, same horrible longing behind your ribs._

_The scene resets. And resets. But now, when you are so wrecked by dreams rich with the scent of his skin, you try something new. Bucky tries to break through your arms and instead of_ —Buck, hold on. I need to tell you something— _the words are—_ Bucky. Look at me. I love you. You are my world. You are my anchor. You are everything good in my life and I will keep telling you that until you believe it _—and he still pulls away but now you’re soft in his ear, hands easy on his hips—_ Don’t go Buck. Stay here with me, you can cry if you need to, I don’t care. I just want to hold you. Just let me hold you. The best you can do is so much more than take a bullet for me. Let me show you. Let me make you happy. Let me be everything you need _—But even still, five points of pressure on your chest, and he’s giving you that black look_ —please let me go. _And so you do._

_The scene resets. Steve tries again. New words this time, new declarations and every one of them true. A thousand swallowed promises now burst from your lips. But every scene ends the same, five points of pressure on your chest._

_There is nothing you can say to stop him; none of your words are enough._

Steve wakes. His eyes open to the blue glow of the pre-dawn sky. Dread and confusion and sadness and hopelessness covers him like a blanket, but at his core, under his ribs, it is warm and he is happy to see the morning light. Because today is another day with him and Steve Rogers doesn’t know how to back down from a fight.

Steve heads downstairs, rounds the corner to the kitchen and stops. Bucky is already there, sitting in his chair. But instead of his usual spot, right next to a pushed up slat in the blinds, he’s sitting back a few feet and the blinds are gone. He’s pulled them all the way up, so they’re stacked at the top of the window. It’s the first time Steve has ever seen this window uncovered.

The lights are off and Steve leaves them that way. He pads quietly into the kitchen, though Bucky must already know he’s there, and says from the middle of the floor, “hey.”

Bucky turns, smiling eyes, “hey.”

Steve makes tea and tries not to replay his fresh fantasies of panting and kissing on the kitchen floor, “Couldn’t sleep?”

“Something like that.”

“Bad dream?”

“…something like that.”

Steve waits for more and is a bit surprised when it comes.

“I don’t know what it is. Dream I’ve had before. What about you?” Bucky turns to face him, eyes glinting a little mischievously, “Bad dreams?”

“Uh—” Steve flushes and it’s ridiculous how well he knows you, “something like that.”

“Tell me about it,” Bucky is still and even with his eyes in shadow Steve knows that look. Knows he’s only asking to deepen the blush across Steve’s cheeks.

“I—” _What if you just told him? I dreamed of a thousand ways to make you shake. I want you so badly that I’ve given up on dreaming our future and taken to re-writing our past,_ “can’t remember. Just woke up and couldn’t go back to sleep,” Steve clears his throat, “What about you?”

He can’t meet Bucky’s eyes or Bucky will certainly call him out. He watches the pot begin to boil and hears Bucky draw a deep breath. He settles into his chair again and speaks toward the window. The sun is just minutes from cresting the horizon.

“Well—” Bucky pauses, “it’s—you know how things happen in dreams but that’s not really what matters? Things happen but it’s more about how you feel, you know?” Bucky doesn’t wait for a reply, “So I’m in this room that’s all doors. No walls just doors. And I’m—” 

Steve brings the mugs of tea around to the table and sits next to him.

“really—panicked,” from the look in his eyes, panicked feels like a softer word than the feeling he’s describing, “I have to get out. And I’m beating on the doors. Shouting because I know they’re locked. I don’t even try the knobs. And I’ve almost lost my voice when I turn around and see that one of the doors is open. Just wide open. And I can see right through it, to the space beyond. Green grass, blue sky, I don’t recognize it.”

“And for the first time I realize—every time I have this dream it feels like realizing—that there’s a place on the other side. I just wanted out and I didn’t really think about— what out meant.” Bucky suddenly turns and holds his eyes, “It sounds obvious, but you can’t leave a place without going to another place,” Bucky’s eyes drift to the wall behind Steve’s head, “There is no no-place.”

A pause hangs.

“And now I have a way out. But I’m just looking through the door. I can’t move. And while I’m staring, another door opens. And another. And the place I’m in becomes less of a place.”

Bucky looks at him again, a little amused, “This is hard to explain. If you’re in a room with the doors closed, that’s a place. But if you open all the doors, then the room and the space outside the room, it’s kind of all one place. Because what’s there to divide it?”

He looks down at his untouched mug, “So the doors keep opening and the place that I’m in is kind of— disappearing. Until every door opens. And when you’re in a room that’s made of doors and every door opens, there’s no room. No doors. They all just vanish. And suddenly, I’m in that new place. I’m standing in the grass and I can feel the breeze and the sun. It’s all around me and the old place is gone. Every door opens and that room doesn’t even exist anymore.”

Bucky sits silently, looking out the window for a while, before he adds, “And I’m frozen. I can’t even accept it and just be where I am. I can’t move. I can’t leave. I just stand there,” Bucky meets his eyes with something like a question on his face, “And then I wake up.”

 

* * *

 

They orbit too close today. Rarely out-of-sight, watching each other, hearts kicking though they don’t know why. They talk in the kitchen and then the living room. Steve makes lunch and Bucky sits on the counter. In the afternoon Bucky leads him to the garage. He’s brought home his motocross bike in the back of his truck and he wants to show Steve some of the modifications he’s made. Steve listens to him talk and daydreams about making him gasp by pinning him to the cold concrete floor.

After dinner, Bucky disappears and reappears in different clothes. He’s wearing a fresh pair of dark canvas pants and a sleeveless shirt Steve’s never seen before. The cloth over his shoulders reaches just far enough to cover the seam of his metal arm. Steve’s eyes trace the muscles of his upper arms and he stumbles for a second when Bucky speaks, “Let’s go.”

“Okay, Uh— Go where?”

“I’ve got a place in mind,” and his smile zips straight through Steve’s exhausted veins. It takes nothing at all now to make his blood rush, “Let’s take your bike.” 

And then they’re out in the twilight, Steve straddling his motorcycle and Bucky swinging his leg over the seat behind him. He settles against Steve’s back and wraps his arms around his waist. He’s so soft and warm and close and Steve’s body is so hungry for his touch that he has to draw a deep breath to remember how to start the bike.

Bucky tells him where to go with new and increasingly resolve-destroying methods: tapping his knees, brushing the side of his ribs, even murmuring in his ear at stop lights. Wherever they’re going there had better be at least an arm rest or a restaurant table or a shopping cart or something Steve can use to fence himself in. 

Bucky eventually tells him to park and resisting is even harder off the bike. Bucky leads him for a couple of blocks and Steve can’t stop his eyes from wandering. His mind has gotten him too riled up and he can’t even look at Bucky, especially not with his arms bare like that, without his hands twitching. Yellow-glow from the downtown street lights and the night is electric. Bucky leads them through some dark entrance. Money changes hands while Steve tries to slow his breathing. It’s not until Bucky’s tugging his hand loosely and giving him a knowing smirk that Steve realizes they’re in some kind of music venue.

But before he can find an excuse to avoid what his gut is telling him to chase, Bucky’s pulled him around the corner and out onto the packed floor. [The music](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6eFCLsFZSA) is loud, really loud. Steve’s heard Bucky listening to some similar songs and they still don’t quite sound like music to his ears. Bucky lets his hand go and takes a few steps. Then turns and holds Steve’s eyes. He’s smiling but there’s something too dark, too hungry there. He’s watching you so he can see the way your head tips back when he starts to dance.

Steve huffs an abrupt exhale and watches Bucky melt into the pulsing crowd. He’s an effortless dancer, blends in with everyone around him. Moving just enough, knees bent, chest barely pushing forward, shoulders falling back. He lets his arms drift up and his eyes scan the crowd. Steve’s hungry eyes drink him in— _is this another dream?_ And when his eyes snap to yours you see the boldest invitation he's ever given you. You’ve barely arrived and you’re already out of control.

Then Bucky drops his eyes and reaches for Steve. Just a second to think— _bad idea, terrible idea_ —before he’s got his hand around your arm and you’d never say no. He pulls Steve closer and yells over the music, “Come on Rogers, I know you can dance.”

And if you hadn’t already let lust uncoil itself in your stomach you’d find the strength to say something other than, “No,” shameless, staring at lips, “Why don’t you teach me?”

Bucky smiles, cocky, dark, knowing, and lets his hands come to rest on Steve’s hips. He says a few words that Steve’s lust-drunk mind is already too far gone to understand. His hands move and he talks as he touches you, like this body is as much his as it is yours. _His hands on your skin, touch him back, touch him back._ He presses light on Steve’s chest, fingertips on his shoulders, strokes a line down his spine that makes Steve’s neck loosen. _Look at his shoulders move, look at the line of his neck._ And when he is finished with his lesson, he steps back and watches Steve, who didn’t hear a word he said and knows he looks ridiculous moving and swaying like this. But Bucky is smiling and that’s all that matters— _come closer with that smile._ If there’s one thing to be said for the music, it’s that it matches the unrelenting throb under his skin. It sounds the way want feels.

Come on, think, why did he bring you here— _breathe in his ear and make him huff the way he does when something feels good_ —think, think. What does he want— _he’s so close, he could be closer._ Steve’s already flushed— _touch him. Isn’t that why you’re here?_ Just reach out and kiss him, fingers under his shirt. Slide your other hand up his arm, make him shiver. _It’s hot in here, too hot._ Can’t tell the difference between the air and your skin. Pull him all the way in, hold him close, hands around his waist. _He wants it or he wouldn’t have brought you here._

And lust demands your attention. You see that now. _Touch him, touch him—fuck._ Everything else you feel, your loyalty and trust and devotion, will all sit quietly. Rein them in and save them for when you’re both ready. But lust demands to be heard. It swells from your body and takes over your mind. It forces the air from your chest, impatient and ravenous. And here, with the lights flashing in his hair, strobing over his skin, you realize for the first time that you can’t wait. 

You want him so bad your hands are shaking. Lust will not be denied: you can walk away from him or you can give in. And you could never walk away from him. 

So give in.

Steve reaches out and his hand settles firm on Bucky’s hip. Steve pulls him in and Bucky comes easy, like he was waiting for this. Steve draws him close and Bucky steps even closer. He slips a foot between Steve’s so his thigh is just brushing the inside of Steve’s. Bucky doesn’t lean back; he lets their chest brush as they dance. Bucky’s head is tipped toward the floor and Steve is watching the edge of his profile. They’ve been this close before but it’s the intention. No excuses now. They’re in a place that’s meant for touching, dancing too close for this to mean anything else. Just undeniable attraction buzzing between you.

The beat takes over for Steve’s heart and pumps his blood for him. The deafening sound throbs in his chest. _Fuck, he feels so good. Just kiss him._ Steve can’t think straight and he spins in the heady chaos— _don’t lose yourself now._

They’re too close to see each others’ eyes and Steve watches what he can see of Bucky’s face. He nose, his lips slightly parted, his neck, his chest— _and where it meets yours_. He breathes in the smell of Bucky’s skin and realizes just how aroused he is. _Pull his hips flush against yours and he’ll feel it too._

Steve tips his head so it just touches Bucky’s temple and Bucky nuzzles into the touch. He pushes back, hungry with a hint of aggression. _He wants you._ For all the tender touches you’ve traded it’s a little shove with his head that sends you spinning. _He wants you_ —and Steve can’t see straight. Bucky huffs and Steve feels the air rush against his neck. The lights are flashing like lightning strikes and every blinding glimpse of him pushes you further off the edge. He’s done waiting. He’s pushing you and you’ll give in. Because he knows exactly how to break you.

In fact, it’s already done. You’re already holding him with no excuse. You’ve already got your nose in his hair, hand on his hip, dancing hot and close, and it’s over. You wanted him to jump but you couldn’t wait.

You said he could come out of the shadows but you haven’t embraced the light yourself. You’re still chasing the dark where you can touch and huff, share heat and soft noises. And hide from the world and the words and the want and yourselves. You’re not waiting; You’re hiding it, like you’ve always been.

You see it now, the way the future is a script you’ll play out. You’ll kiss him. Soon. Probably tonight if you stay here. He is pushing you because he knows you can’t stop the slip and he doesn’t want you to. If you kiss him he’ll kiss you back. If you grind into him he will moan in your mouth. The gap between you is closing and there’s no stopping it.

You’ll fight it the whole way down but once you’ve tasted his lips you’ll know there’s no return to hesitation. You’ll be sneaking kisses around hallway corners. He’ll ask for them, dark eyes, more often than you’ll give in to them. Until you’re kissing him hard and hungry, pushing him into the couch while the rest of the world sleeps. Chasing pleasure, stretched out between his legs, melting together, trying to smother your sounds so you won’t wake Sam. 

You asked with your body and he pushed you away. You asked with your words and he said no. And now you see that you’re not waiting. You’re finding a way to get what you want without talking about it. Without naming this thing between you, or putting words to how much you mean to each other. You just give and take in the dark and act like your hearts don’t beat in time. He deserves better than that. 

Because if you insist on waiting there will be no waiting. You’ll press against each other until you can’t stop yourselves. Until you’re pulling him up the stairs to your room, crawling over him on your bed, tugging off his shirt with these same shaking hands. And it’ll slip from your lips when you’re fumbling with his belt buckle— _I love you, I love you._

And you’ll have missed your chance. To tell him before you knew the taste of his skin. Before you undressed him in the moonlight. Before you knew the sound of him gasping your name when he’s lost his mind with pleasure. 

You’ll have missed your chance to make him believe it. To tell him that you love all of him, without exception. The way his eyes are soft and curious and home and vicious and cold at war. The way he laughs and the way he ends some lives to spare others. You love him so deeply you’re swallowed up in it. You love him too deeply to say. He needs to know because he has no idea how bright he is. _Why are you always fucking hesitating?_ You could have told him months ago if you weren’t falling into the same trap that’s ensnared him, thinking you can hurt him with your devotion. You’ve had so many chances. So many missed moments.

So why don’t you tell him now? There is no choice, really, to be made.

Steve leans back just enough to see Bucky’s eyes. He is so beautiful. Cheeks flushed, pupils blown, and eyes full of questions he’s fighting to hide. You’d hold him like this forever if you could—dark and warm and unsure because that’s what you two are good at. Bucky tips his chin back to say— _if you want it, then take it_. He wants you to kiss him, and you will. But not yet. 

Steve takes Bucky’s hand and leads him back outside. The music fades to staticky city street noise and Steve realizes how hard he’s been breathing. Deep, slow breaths back to his bike but he doesn’t let go of Bucky’s hand. Steve gets on without looking back at Bucky, lest he lose what last shred of resolve he has left, push him to the brick building a few feet away, and groan into his skin— _is this what you wanted?_ Bucky slips on behind him and settles in closer than he’s ever been. He melts against Steve’s back and his hands don’t just rest around his waist, they touch and slide and feel. 

Steve pulls away from the curb and Bucky lets a hand drop from Steve’s waist to rest against his inner thigh. As if to say— _take me home_. Steve nearly loses control of the bike. He wavers a bit, misses his turn, and tries to remember how to drive. Lust is so thick that’s it’s filled him, his cock so hard that the vibrations from the bike are making it hard to concentrate.

 _What if you just took him home?_ You wouldn’t be able to talk without touching him. And if you’re touching him then he’ll be sliding closer. Until you’re kissing in the kitchen, his knee pressing up between your thighs, and you’re slipping your hands in his back pockets. Pull off his shirt and palm his erection. Suck his neck until it bruises. Pant on his skin. Make him moan. Push against his body and tell him how badly you want him. Fist your hand in his hair— _and then would he know? How you really feel?_

Would he know you want all of him and you would do all this with the lights on? In the park. At the zoo. In front of everyone. Or will you stumble closer and closer and let him hide himself behind that mask?

He wants you to take the first step so you will, but he still has to jump. _Do it now, there’s a diner that’s still open._ Pull over and open your arms. Tell him now.

Steve pulls over and parks the bike at the curb. They both get off and Steve leads him inside. It looks familiar but Steve’s mind is too wrapped up in everything he wants to say to remember the last time they were here together. He leads Bucky to a booth and they sit.

Steve finally stills and looks up at Bucky’s face. He is stunning. A face you know better than your own. And his eyes are so soft and welcoming and a touch amused at whatever they see on your face. It’s not as hard as you expected to open your mouth and let the words spill out, “Bucky,” now Steve is reaching for his hand and Bucky’s eyes track it until they’re touching, “Will you get a place with me?” Bucky’s eyes snap back to his face. Something sharp there but Steve continues, “I want to get an apartment where we can spend more time alone. In our own space. And just—” Steve swallows, “see where things go.” 

Even if he’s choosing open-ended words, the more he says the clearer the meaning becomes, “I want to be alone with you, Buck. If you want to—” Steve looks down at the counter for a moment— _if you want to let me touch you. Because I want to, so badly. I want to kiss you. Take your clothes off. Fingers on your skin with no limits. I want to make you shake in my bed. Make you moan and sweat. Pick you apart. Till your eyes are blown black and your mouth falls open. But you already know all that_ —and then back at Bucky’s face, “I want—to be closer,” Steve’s voice hushes, “I want all of you. I love you.”

Bucky’s eyes have faded and his eyebrows have knit. But he doesn’t say anything so Steve continues, “Bucky I don’t want anything but you. If you want to go somewhere else I’ll go in heartbeat. You’re everything. At home and away from home and that’s exactly how I want it. You are all my missing pieces,” Steve’s spilling and spilling, you have so many words to give him, _let him see how deep this well is_ , “You’re the light of my life and my reason to live. When I lost you, I lost myself too. And the thought of messing up with you terrifies me, but I want this, Buck,” Steve squeezes his hand, “If you want to try, then I want to try with you.”

“Steve,” his voice is too low, too quiet. _Come on, Buck, come on. Just say yes. Just give me the chance. Let’s tumble off the edge together._

And Steve should wait for him to speak but he can’t. He lifts his hand to Bucky’s cheek, “Let me love you, Bucky.”

Bucky draws a shuddering breath, too fast, and sits back. He swallows and looks down at the counter in a rush. He meets Steve’s eyes and all the warmth on his face has soured to fear, “I can’t—” it’s barely a whisper, “I can’t do this. I shouldn’t—” Bucky shakes his head, looks like he can’t breathe, “I have to go.”

“That’s okay, hey, that’s fine,” Steve is still holding his hand, “We’ll go as slow as you want.”

“No—” shaking his head more insistently, “I need to leave. I need some time—away. Not forever. Just to think. I just need some time to think. Not ready to—” Bucky’s eyes are closing off.

Steve’s heart has plummeted straight through the floor. Black pit, desperation in his voice when he says, “What are you waiting for, Buck?”

Bucky blinks. Blank eyes, blank face, “You’re right.” He stands and walks out the diner door.

 

 

You watch his back disappear into the dark.

 

 

You asked him to jump and he did. And he slipped right through your grip again. He fell, reaching for you, and you reaching for him. It wasn’t enough. And when he was beyond arm’s reach, you just sat there and watched him go.

Numb. You look out the plate glass windows expecting snow and all you see is black. Black dread. Dark loss. Steve feels like he’s going to throw up. He gasps a breath and realizes his face is wet. _He’s gone._

 _Were you too eager?_ Steve starts to wonder but the pain is too fresh, too real, too close. _He’s gone._ He stares out at the black sky and thinks of nothing. He sits and wills himself to breathe. A familiar looking woman appears by his table but she’s not reeling off specials or asking for his order. She just sets down a piece of berry pie and walks away. Steve stares at it and feels himself let go of the train— _I can’t do this again._ He stares at the slice and wonders, before anything else, what Bucky would think of it. If he would like the flavor. The face he would make when he tasted it, curious and pleased, because he loves everything he tries. A wrecked sob rips through his lungs. Bleed out through new wounds ripped from old stitches. 

The world folds itself into this diner booth until it is just Steve and a gaping hole. He drops his face in his hands and his chest convulses. _He’s gone. He’s gone._ Somewhere deep in Steve’s mind there is voice urging action, there is a part of him that knows sitting here and sobbing won’t change anything. And there is a voice beside that one, arguing wordlessly because words are lost to him now, that not even the death of every Hydra agent left on the planet could bring him back. _And what good are you when death is not the answer?_

Steve spins and sinks. Time passes and the night deepens. He draws shaky breaths and keeps his face behind his hands because he can’t look at the empty seat across from him.

Then his phone buzzes. Steve jumps to see its screen. _It’s Sam._ Not now—Steve slips his phone back into his pocket. Whatever it is can wait. It vibrates and vibrates then falls silent. Not ten seconds later it buzzes again. Steve considers shutting it off as he glances at the screen and jolts, hands fumbling to answer it— _it’s Bucky._

“Hello?” his voice is too hopeful.

“Steve,” it’s Sam, calling from Bucky’s phone. 

“Oh—Sam,” Steve replies lamely.

“Why do I have a very upset super-soldier in my house packing up all his shit?”

Steve is so spent he just stares at the table and says nothing.

“What the fuck is going on?” Sam’s tone is biting, irritated, bordering on angry, and confusion swims through the fog of grief in Steve’s mind.

“He’s—leaving.”

Sam’s voice jumps to furious, yelling through the phone, “And you’re letting him?!”

 


	20. Welcome Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even shadows flee before the sun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soundtrack suggestion!
> 
> You & Me by Disclosure feat. Eliza Doolittle (Flume Remix)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zPlr-o-YEQ

Seven steps from the front door to the truck. Toss the last of it in the back. Jerk open the door and sink into the driver’s seat. Your lungs collapse and you brace your hands against the wheel. Your heart is pounding in your chest.

Bucky’s arms are shaking and his ribs are too tight, can’t breathe. He ran all the way back to Sam’s house but that’s not why he’s out of breath. It’s the look on Steve’s face that he’ll always remember. How soft and vulnerable he was, pouring out his heart for you. Then how devastated he was to see you go. How could you let this happen? How could you get so close when you knew you had to leave? 

You ripped open the seams and now you’ll bleed out. Drive till you don’t recognize the streets and pull over. Shut off the car and sob. How could you do this to him. And if you can’t find a way to fix it then don’t bother coming back.

Doubt is a slick black oil over everything. You doubt the world because you question your lens. Is anything as it seems? Can anything good come from you? You doubt yourself and poison everything you love. _Why are you even taking the truck?_ You should leave it here.

He asked you to settle down but it sounded like— _run away with me_. And in spite of his panic, Bucky’s body is still flooded with pleasure. Close your eyes, tip your head back against the seat, and even with your ragged breathing— _fuck, he felt good._ He pulled you in, his hand on your hip— _shit_. His head next to yours, _he wants you_. He asked you to move in with him. He is in love with you. _And you are in love with him._ It’s too much, his words too soft, and against your better judgment your heart is crying out— _don’t run._

You should have left when you still could. Before it meant tearing yourself to pieces. But you played like you could just come home and tied your heart to a man you couldn’t have. _Could this be any worse?_

Bucky’s unfocused eyes snap to clarity. A single headlight approaching in the street. _Steve_. Yes, it can be worse. _He’s going to chase you._ And before he has even arrived, before he has even pinned you with his blue eyes and reached for you, you feel your resolve crumbling. _Steve, I can’t hold out much longer._ _I’m going to sink us both._ Bucky drops his head and gives up trying to still the shake. You are angry at the unknown because the unknown is dangerous and so are you.

Steve pulls up, parks his bike and Bucky gets out of the truck. He walks to the asphalt in front of the hood and waits. Steve steps off and runs up to him; Bucky would laugh if he wasn’t trying so hard to hold it together. _He’s going to chase you._ That’s more than you can take.

“Bucky—” he’s getting closer and closer, until he stops just a few feet away, “Hold on.”

Bucky crosses his arms in front of his chest and says nothing because he doesn’t trust his voice.

“I just wanted to say,” Steve takes a step closer, “that if this is what you want, then I won’t stop you. But I don’t want you to do it for me— or anyone else,” Steve takes another step closer and Bucky’s eyes lower, “I want to be with you. That’s my choice to make,” Steve is trying to hold his eyes, so Bucky will see the smile when he says, “Hey, you couldn’t stop me from going to war and running away won’t stop me loving you. You know I don’t give up easy.”

 _I know Steve, that’s the problem,_ “What you want will hurt you.”

“When have you ever hurt me?”

Bucky huffs a horrible little laugh and looks away.

“Bucky—when have _you_ ” Steve reaches out and touches his chest with the tip of finger, “ever hurt me?”

Bucky’s eyes return to Steve’s.

“Never. And you never will,” Steve’s fingertip falls from Bucky’s chest and he lets his hand rest on the top of Bucky’s crossed forearms. 

He’s pulling at your armor; how many more fears will you throw at him? “You deserve better than this,” Bucky’s voice is rough.

“What’s better?”

“A wife to cry over your grave.”

“Buck—” Steve’s searching his face, “it’s not like that now. There’s no shame, in two men—”

Bucky shakes his head, “That’s not what I mean,” he draws a shallow breath and tries again, “You will get yourself killed,” speaking too close to the truth, Bucky’s voice is wavering, “We both will. You need someone to remember you. Someone that will still be around to cry on your headstone. Not a coldblooded killer that’ll follow you out of the plane,” Bucky’s voice cracks and he blinks for a moment, eyes welling, before continuing, “You don’t need another gun at your back. I’m a fucking shadow,” he’s cracking, tears escaping, emotion pitching and breaking around his words, “and you deserve more than that.” 

Retch your worst fears, your blackest doubts on the asphalt at his feet. _You deserve someone that can leave the war behind. Or better yet, never joined it in the first place._ “You fell in love with a man that kills too quickly and what kind of a man is that.” Bucky gasps a breath and holds it so he won’t sob. Drops his head to hide his face behind his hair. 

Steve steps even closer, touching now, and wraps his arms around Bucky’s waist. He rests his forehead on Bucky’s hair. 

His voice is soft, “Perfect,” he breathes in the scent of Bucky’s hair and hums, “Brilliant. Bright. Curious. Strong,” Steve’s hands drift up and down Bucky’s back, soft touch over his spine, strokes over his shoulder blades, “Ruthless when he has to be. Kind. Compassionate. Intelligent.” 

Steve is ducking his head so he’s speaking the words into the pocket of air between their chests, “Funny. Loyal. Charming. That’s exactly what I need. You’re exactly what I need. I need someone who's always had my back,” Steve’s arm reaches all the way around Bucky’s waist and pulls him in tight, “I need the man who told me I had nothing to prove when the world had written me off. I want the man who has always seen the best in me, and didn’t understand how everyone else couldn’t see it too. The best I can hope to deserve is someone to keep me honest.” 

Steve lifts his other hand and brings it to Bucky’s cheek. He wipes the back of his fingers over Bucky’s tears, “I have tried to throw my life away and you remind me why it’s worth holding on to. And when I’m too blind to see it you rip me out of the water, you shove me off the grenade and close your own fist around it. I’ve been reckless but you never give up on me. That’s more than I deserve.” Steve’s fingers drift back along Bucky’s jaw, his thumb resting on Bucky’s cheek.

“I am too ready to fight and I need someone that makes me think before I jump. I am who I am because of you. The only reason Captain America is more than a stage act is because he had to save his best friend.” 

Bucky lets his head drop forward and down, tucking into the curve of Steve’s neck. He sobs and lets his body shake as Steve holds him close, hand on the back of his neck. Steve’s voice drops further, just murmuring in Bucky’s ear, “I love you. I’ve always loved you. And I need you. I haven’t had anything to come home to in the longest time and I was starting to lose myself. But now I have you.”

Bucky can feel Steve’s lips curl a bit before he says, “If you would ever stay the fuck at home.”

Bucky sobs out a laugh and Steve laughs too. That beautiful, wet laughter through tears that always seems to come when the sky cracks into blue. When you realize you’ve survived the worst of it and you can see the dawn about to break. Bucky lets his arms drop to his sides and Steve immediately closes the gap, pressed hip-to-hip, stomach-to-stomach, chest-to-chest. Bucky slides his hands around Steve’s waist. He can feel two heartbeats on his skin, hot breath in his hair. _You feel._ And isn’t that enough? 

You worry but all the world is beauty. And maybe you can simply live. You point to this void in your chest, but even shadows flee before the sun.

Steve’s murmuring soft words, fingers searching up into his hair, “I don’t have a reason to fight without you. And I don’t have a reason to come home if you’re not here. You’re everything. You’re everything. I miss you when you leave for an hour. If you want to go, I’ll let you go. But please stay,” Steve’s fingers press against his skin, “Please stay.”

Steve is so close. He’s holding you so fiercely. Slit your throat and he will stitch it closed again. You can’t die.

Steve’s hand slides under Bucky’s chin and he lifts his head. Leans back just far enough to see his eyes when he says, “Let me live for you, give you everything you need. Let me love you, Bucky.”

Bucky lifts his hand between them and rests the tips of his fingers on Steve’s chest. Every door opens and you are not where you were. Bucky watches his eyes, five points of pressure on Steve’s chest, and jumps. He closes his fingers into a fist around Steve’s shirt and pulls him in. Closes the gap and kisses him.

It’s warm and soft and wet with tears and so perfect that the world stops. Bucky breathes in the smell of him, as close as he can get, and huffs a surprised sigh. You didn’t think anything could feel this good. He pulls away just far enough, hot air between their lips, to kiss him again. Electricity through his veins, melting him from the inside out. Pull back to kiss him again, and again. Let your lips part just enough to fit around his bottom lip. 

Steve makes a hungry little sound and lets his lips open. Wet kisses, slick lips, drawn in so close you only pull back until your noses are just touching. The ache becomes a perfect bloom of want. Lick your lips and kiss him again; lust consumes you and for once you just let it wash.

Bucky slips his tongue over Steve’s bottom lip and draws it into his mouth. Steve moans breathlessly—a sound that shoots straight to Bucky’s stomach—and deepens it, pushing Bucky back against the truck behind him. Bucky settles his hand on Steve’s chest to feel his heart racing and breathes a pleased, eager sound into his mouth.

And with that, huffing sounds at each other, too far gone, too wrecked by touch and emotion, they let go of the pier and swim into ecstasy. Steve’s kissing him deeply, hand behind his neck pulling him even closer. He swiftly moves his other hand to the back of Bucky’s leg. He lifts him effortlessly and pushes back, so Bucky’s sitting on the hood of the truck. 

His hand slides down Bucky’s thigh, fingertips digging greedily, until he hooks his hand under the back of Bucky’s bent knee. Steve pulls him forward, until Bucky’s legs are splayed, hips pressed to Steve’s, then he pulls a bit further, deepening it, grinding together. 

They’re both so hard, the pressure sends a shock of pleasure down Bucky’s legs. So strong it makes his feet flex, fingers curl. Bucky moans, loud and surprised and pleading. He leans back and pulls Steve down with him. Until he’s flat on his back on the hood of the truck with Steve between his legs, leaning over him. Bucky’s got both hands in Steve’s hair and he’s kissing him desperately. Making up for every missed kiss. Every moment spent alone. Every word left unsaid. Kiss and fit together like the puzzle pieces you made yourselves to be.

Of course, this is how it goes. Not some dramatic battlefield sacrifice. No bombs or bullets. No blood and bruising; no one had to die. You’ve already done all that and proved your love a hundred times over. Now be human and put it into words and things softer than words. Just quiet voices, broken with emotion, in the street in front of this house. Two Brooklyn boys, foolish in love. That’s all.

Steve pulls away to kiss wetly down Bucky’s neck and whisper into his hair, “Please don’t go.”

Bucky laughs again, still wet but his tears are drying, “Okay,” he pulls Steve up so he can see the light in Bucky’s eyes, “I won’t,” kiss him softly, melting all over again, “I can’t.”

Every door opens and the world stretches out, flat and endless, around the two of you. What was is now gone and you are here. Some place new, but you are together. You made yourselves strong enough to come back from the war. You survived it all and you are still soft enough to melt. 

Welcome home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! :D Phew!!! I knew the end would be a bit of a roller coaster so I hope you all didn’t mind waiting a bit longer for this big final update! I figured you’d rather have it all at once!
> 
> First of all: IT’S OVER!! Thank you so much to everyone that has been reading along and leaving kudos and comments. I hope you’ve enjoyed the story!! A special thanks to all of my regular commenters; reading your thoughts has been, by far, the most rewarding part of writing this piece. ^.^ Your feedback has truly helped me grow as a writer and improved the quality of my work. I can’t thank you enough, lovelies. What a pleasure it’s been!
> 
> Second: IT’S NOT OVER!! :D:D:D:D I’m doing a sequel called Melt Into, Melt Until to explore what happens with these two after they ride off into the sunset. Be forewarned: the premise is that Steve wants to take things slow. So, you know: sex, but also agony. It's over here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/2050038
> 
> Finally: Let me know what you thought! I’d love to hear your feedback in the comments. What worked, what didn’t work, which moments you liked, which confused you/felt rushed/didn’t fit. What you thought of the POV switching between Steve and Bucky with each chapter, the third-person/second-person/inner dialog narrative fluidity, the near-continuous present tense, or the overall characterization. Anything you want to talk about! :) (You can also drop me an anon on Tumblr if you’d prefer!)
> 
> Thank you for reading!!

**Author's Note:**

> Come chat with me on Tumblr! notoska.tumblr.com

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Every Door Opens [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1857414) by [yviesuniverse (orphan_account)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/yviesuniverse)




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